1745- Latest News update
Times of Malta says the police are investigating a Ponzi scheme after several Maltese people reported losing hundreds of euros.
MaltaToday says A judge will on Monday start hearing a copyright claim filed by theatre and film producer Mario Philip Azzopardi against blogger Manuel Delia, over Delia’s publication of the script to Azzopardi’s play “ix-Xiha” on his blog.
Newsbook says Labour MP and former minister Carmelo Abela told a court that police did not question him over the 2010 HSBC heist when he voluntarily made himself available to the investigations.
TVM says The Maltese flag has registered a record increase of over 51% in the registration of superyachts over 24 metres in length – as a result of which Malta has become the jurisdiction of choice and one of the leaders in this sector, with over 1,030 registered superyachts.
Updated 1230 – Mid-Day Briefing
Three initiatives to fight bureaucracy launched: Government has announced three new initiatives aimed at reducing bureaucracy and easing businesses’ access to financial services. These include a right to a basic account for the self-employed and other firms, and the establishment of a Credit Review Office to act as a mediator between commercial banks and their clients on applications for loans that are refused by the bank. The third measure revolves around the collection of one set of due diligence data when this is required by separate government entities.
Less than a thousand registering for work: Unemployment reached historically low levels, the NSO said today, with the jobless number more than halved over the past twelve months. Data provided by Jobsplus for May 2022 indicates a year-on-year decrease of 994 persons registering under Part I, and an additional drop of 46 persons registering under Part II of the unemployment register. Registered unemployment levels decreased across all age groups for both males and females. Males accounted for 71.7% of total registrants while females accounted for the remaining 28.3%. The largest share of males and females on the unemployment register sought occupations as clerical support workers.
Slight decline in retail trade: Retail business activity in Malta declined slightly in May, Eurostat has shown. The volume of trade contracted by 1.1% on the previous month, despite registering a significant increase of 7.8% over the same month last year, when a number of restrictions were still in place. The volume of retail trade went up by 0.2% in the euro area and remained unchanged in the EU.
Covid-19 Update: 614 new cases were reported on Wednesday, according to health authorities. This has taken the active case tally to 7,845.
Morning Briefing
Major development in Caruana Galizia murder as Degiorgio confesses to role in killing
A major development relating to the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia took place on Tuesday, suspect George Degiorgio confessing to his role in the plot. Degiorgio made the admission with Reuters, insisting that the assassination was “just business”, and insists he has no intention of “going down alone” for the murder. Degiorgio, his brother Alfred and accomplice Vince Muscat were arrested and charged in December 2017 with carrying out the murder. Degiorgio also revealed that he is ready to provide testimony to implicate others in the murder, as well as a separate plot to kill the journalist that ended up being called off. (Times of Malta)
PM wants permission to run larger deficits
Malta is pushing the EU to continue permitting its members to run larger deficits for the foreseeable future, according to Prime Minister Robert Abela. Speaking in Parliament, Abela stated that he had informed his peers that the EU should continue to permit high deficits as it has been doing in the aftermath of the Covid-19 outbreak as he delivered a speech in Parliament on the most recent two European Council meetings. While insisting on the importance of fiscal discipline, the PM said that he had spoken to his EU counterparts about “the challenges Malta was facing, and insisted that we must have the flexibility to intervene in favour of a stable supply of gas and to remain economically competitive”. (Newsbook)
Court finds illegality in ARMS bills
A judge ruled that the national utilities company ARMS’s method of billing customers for their power use was not only inaccurate, but also unlawful, in a ruling that is anticipated to have a significant impact on consumers. Madam Justice Anna Felice, who presided over the First Hall of the Civil Court, was ruling on a lawsuit that two customers had brought against ARMS in 2017. The PN said that the ruling “confirms that the excuse used by the government, that this billing system was a result of a Legal Notice introduced by a PN government in 2009 is simply a lie. The court clearly declared that the method used by the Labour government in 2014 is in breach of that Legal Notice and not a result of following it.” In a statement issued by the Ministry for the Environment, Energy and Enterprise, it claimed that “the legal notice in question was introduced in 2009 and that the only change since then had been the 25% reduction in bills.” (Maltatoday)
