As of Monday, third-country nationals will be able to work legally in Malta before their work permits have been approved, a move that it is bound to welcomed by employers.

It currently takes Identity Malta an average of between six to eight weeks to process applications for single-work permits but, with labour in short supply, they often end up working illegally before the process has been completed.

However, Identity Malta confirmed that it will now start issuing temporary work permits to people once they have submitted all of their documents and have had their biometrics taken and once their prospective employer has notified JobsPlus that their employment has commenced.

The temporary work permits will not be valid for travel.

“This new procedure will loosen the pressure on the labour market and reduce the likelihood of workers getting caught working without the necessary authorisation,” parliamentary secretary for citizenship Julia Farrugia Portelli said. The Maltese economy is growing at an unprecedented rate and unemployment is at its lowest level in history, but this has created fresh challenges for the labour market. There are now more vacant jobs than there are are job-seekers, which has forced employers to resort to foreign workers.”

Photo: Eurostat

The new system comes a day after Eurostat published data showing Malta’s population increased by a whopping 15,700 in 2017 – over 15 times the EU average when considering the rate of populations.

To put the figures in perspective, this means that Malta’s population increased by 3.3% and the workforce by 7.7% in a single year.

The influx of foreign labour continued this year, with Identity Malta receiving 7,214 work-permit applications between January and April – mostly from Serbia, the Philippines, India, Nepal, Macedonia and Pakistan.

In the coming weeks, Identity Malta will also launch an online platform to allow applicants to submit their application online while they are still abroad. Applicants and their prospective employers will be able to obtain real-time updates on the status of their application, a measure aimed at ensuring applicants submit all the necessary documentation at the start.

What do you make of this announcement?

READ NEXT: 13 Great Places In Malta For An After-Work Pint

Tim Diacono

Tim is interested in the rapid evolution of human society and is passionate about justice, human rights and cutting-edge political debates. You can follow him on Instagram or Twitter/X at @timdiacono or reach out to him at [email protected]