Steward Health Care agrees, in principal, with idea of its employees being absorbed by public sector

• ‘We were promised equal conditions at the start of employment’ – Steward employees

Steward Health Care Malta agrees, in principal, with the idea of having its employees absorbed into the public sector, a spokesperson for the company told The Malta Independent. The spokesperson said, however, that this would be the government’s prerogative.

This answer comes in reply to a number of questions asked by The Malta Independent after being approached by Steward Health Care employees regarding discrepancies in salaries and leave between them and their state-employed counterparts who also work in the same Steward-run hospitals. Steward Health Care manages the Gozo General Hospital, St Luke’s Hospital and Karin Grech Hospital.

This issue already made headlines in October of last year with the UHM – Voice of the Workers threatening to take industrial action if Steward workers were not absorbed by the government in order to ensure equal pay among healthcare workers, since they do the same job.

Steward Health Care had not issued a reaction back then, but answering questions by this newsroom in relation to the recent problems brought up by employees regarding unequal pay and conditions and whether the

discrepancies have been addressed, in addition to whether they agree with the UHM, a spokesperson for the company said that Steward agrees with the UHM’s proposal in principal, but this falls under the government’s remit.

The spokesperson added that while Steward Health Care employees are private sector employees, “the company appreciates the concerns around this matter and is in active discussions with the relevant stakeholders (including health authorities) on the matter.”

However, the company also noted that the law enforces equal pay for work of equal value when employed by same employer (same legal entity), which it says is not the case here.

It is pertinent to note that the hospital concession has been a hotly debated topic in the country, and the PN had been calling for the revocation of the contract, arguing that the contract is not in the national interest.

“When we were employed, everyone knew that we would be employed by a private company (Steward), however, the company has a private-public agreement with the government wherein they use public or private resources whenever they need to. This puts us on the bad side of it all as we’re always kind of stuck in the middle,” Steward employees explained to this newsroom.

They said that during a meeting with the Human Resources department at the start of their employment, they were informed that they will have the same conditions as government employees.

This was the case in the first year or so, but then Steward staff started noticing certain discrepancies with regard to salary as well as study, maternity and sports leave. For example, with regard to leave, government employees in Steward run hospitals can carry over 100% of their remaining leave while Steward employees are only allowed to carry over 5 days, the sources said.

They said that there were also certain inconsistencies among Steward staff themselves at times.

“The company also stopped our increments, meaning that our pay remained the same this year because they told us that they do not have enough funding for us due to the pandemic.”

“We are working the exact same job as government employees, under the same exact management, just employed by a different entity. We have no problem working under Steward, but we were promised one thing and given something else.” This includes a yearly performance review which never happened, despite employees asking Steward about it, the spokesperson said.

They explained that things have worsened with the new Allied Agreement signed last month between UHM board members and the Collective Bargaining Unit, which saw government employees get a pay rise while Steward employees got nothing; resulting a larger rift between the two.

Since voicing their concerns to this newsroom, the group of Steward workers in question had a meeting with Chief of Staff at Office of the Deputy Prime Minister and Health Ministry Lorenzo Vella, where they were told that the authorities are doing their best to find a solution for these concerns.

“This is encouraging as at least we know that our efforts are bearing some fruit, but this has been going on for years now,” sources explained.

Attempts to contact Prime Minister Robert Abela and Health Minister Chris Fearne were in vain, however OPM Chief of Staff Clyde Caruana said that their concerns are being heard.

“We just want equality, as it is not really fair that we are doing the same job and working under the same management, but our pay and allowances are all different. If we were not promised this in the beginning it would have been a different story. This concerns the whole issue between Vitals and Steward which has us stuck in the middle as no one knows what is happening in the agreements or contracts,” the employees noted.

Steward is a private employer-company and as such establishes its own recruitment and remuneration policies

Following these claims, The Malta Independent spoke with Steward Health Care to get the company’s view on their employees’ worries and why such discrepancies still exist.

A spokesperson for the company explained that allied health employees working at Steward-managed hospitals are either employed by Steward directly or by the Ministry for Health, “which are naturally two different legal entities.”

“Steward is a private employer and as such establishes its own recruitment and remuneration policies. These policies are different to the ones adopted by the Ministry for Health, which is bound by the Public Service Management Code for public sector employees. Any employees employed by Steward applied directly for employment with Steward (i.e. were not transferred from Government to Steward) and the employer-employee relationship is thus completely distinct to the Government of Malta-public officer relationship,” they said.

While it is common practice for governmental departments/authorities to have a mix of public sector employees and private sector employees (provided by a contractor) to perform similar services, such employees are bound by their respective employer and contractual obligations, they added. “This practice predates Steward’s granting of the concession and is still active in many other sectors.”

When asked about the lack of yearly performance reviews, the spokesperson said that salary increases are discretionary and not guaranteed, something which is standard in the private sector and also reflected in their employee’s contract.

“Salary increases have been granted to Steward employees over the past years and increases this year are currently under review. Moreover, Steward has always provided the statutory increases it was obliged to provide by law.”

With regard to Steward employees feeling like they are caught in the middle of agreements between the company and the government, the spokesperson said that there are no agreements with the government on workers who are employed directly by Steward.

“Steward’s main obligation is to provide safe and sustainable healthcare to the Maltese people. To attain this, we sometimes have to employ individuals directly as these are not, or cannot, be provided by the Ministry for Health. There is no agreement with Government on such employees’ conditions, and indeed such employees are privately recruited by Steward to ensure that it continues to provide the quality of healthcare that is incumbent with its position.”