“For some reason, which I am still unable to understand, both DIER and platforms like Bolt have done absolutely nothing so far to follow up on the guidelines and regularise the market,” he said. 

“When RecruitGiant went public with its concerns, rather than finding support, Bolt terminated our contract.”

Mikalauskas also claimed that RecruitGiant had become “regular targets for certain sections of the media” amid reports of the contracts the company offers its couriers. 

Rather, he insists that RecruitGiant has been working to bring clear guidelines to its operations, claiming that it has even lost business because of it. 

“I am, and always will be, happy to discuss and defend our operations. I am proud of the fact that RecruitGiant has led the way in ensuring that the TCNs for who we find employment in Malta are given the best possible employment conditions, despite the longstanding resistance of the food delivery companies who are now claiming, finally, to be taking action,” he said. 

Mikalauskas confirmed that Maltese law, which is based around a 40-hour working week, does not cover platform workers, opening up the door to abuse, which he says Recruit Giant has been trying to resolve.

He said that DIER appeared to be taking the matter into its own hands and allowed guidelines issued by the department following the first round of meetings.

“The result? The short answer is a loss of business. As soon as we adopted the DIER guidelines, drivers immediately began to resign,” he said.

“This is because other fleets continued, and continue to this day, to operate irregularly. They do this by officially paying drivers a minimum wage but then topping this up through additional undeclared cash payments.” 

“The result is that drivers are happy to be employed irregularly and willing to accept other abusive conditions to earn that little extra cash which they can send home to their loved ones.”

“Once this trend became clear, RecruitGiant had two options. We could either join the crowd or take a stand in favour of proper regulation. In this, we had hoped to find DIER and platforms like Bolt on our side.”

However, nothing has happened since then. Despite the criticism, Mikalauskas insists that RecruitGiant operates correctly and does not profit from relocating third-country nationals to Malta.

“We have always pushed for Malta to properly regulate the platform economy and remain bemused by the lack of concrete action on this front from these same authorities.”

“We have never made any profit from the process of relocating TCNs to Malta, earning our money from the fees we earn from the businesses to which we supply employees.”

“It is right that we have a serious debate in the country about how TCNs are recruited and their employment conditions in Malta. But for that debate to be productive, it must look at the sector in its entirety.”

“RecruitGiant will not shy away from this debate, but we also expect the Government, platforms like Bolt and other fleet operators who continue to act illegally to face the same scrutiny and to be asked for their stand on why Malta tolerates the abusive employment of TCNs.”