Transport regulator admits violating Constitution, labour law

Two former transport authority employees were yesterday award-ed €12,000 each in compensation after the regulator admitted to have broken the law and the Constitution of Malta.

George Schembri and Concetta Abela were both part-time clerks with the transport authority when their three-month contracts were converted into indefinite ones. They were fired shortly afterwards due to what the authority described as "legal reasons and administrative procedures".

During hearings before an Industrial Tribunal, the authority admitted to breaking the law and the Constitution by failing to send the employment commencement and termination forms to the Employment Training Corporation.

This rendered their employment null according to the authority, the tribunal said.

The employee's job did not exist as far as the ETC was concerned, the tribunal added.

Even if the tribunal accepted the authority's thesis that the em-ployee's jobs were null because of such breach of the law, the authority could have treated the employee's in any way it wanted.

The authority, in its breach of the law, had denied the employees any legal protection and could fire them when and how it wanted to, as in fact it had done, the tribunal said.

The tribunal, chaired by Franco Masini, found that Ms Abela and Mr Schembri had been unfairly dismissed and ordered that they are paid €12,000 each by the authority. Ms Abela was also ordered to be reinstated immediately.

Lawyer Robert Abela appeared for both Ms Abela and Mr Schembri.