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The Role of the Consumers' Association
in Malta -
Speech
delivered during a TAIEX meeting held in
Malta in November, 2000.
In order to understand the role that consumer organisation
can play in Malta in the implementation of legislation,
new and old, one must take a look at the economic and
cultural environment within which we operate.
The size of Malta imposes several
economic limitations. Among them it dictates that certain
basic services are basically monopolistic. Apart from this
the size also makes it possible for one firm to dictate
the market or for unofficial cartels to develop. On the
other hand, it should make market surveillance more
efficient. The same applies to enforcement.
There are two economic factors which
also had an impact on the economic framework which we
apply. First, during the middle of last century, Malta had
to transform its economic structure from a fortress
economy to a commercial economy. One of the effects was
massive unemployment and emigration. Consequently,
unemployment is seen as the factor which must be
controlled. Second, the size of Malta did not make it an
attractive proposition for the private sector to provide
the basic economic infrastructure. Thus government
intervention and the large involvement of government in
our economy.
The main result of such a scenario, is
that the consumer never featured prominently in our
economic thinking. So much so, that whereas we have an
Office of Fair Competition, we do not have a monopolies
commission. This was in spite of the warnings that Malta’s
small size may discourage competition. Again, even in the
more recent past, in order to make wireless telephone and
cable television an attractive investment for the private
sector, the government had to grant a monopoly status in
both sectors.
Another factor which must be considered
is our cultural environment. There are two factors which
contribute to the lack of a strong civil society and the
dependence on government. First is our colonial past which
has embedded in our culture a sense of powerlessness. Thus
the reluctance to join organisations and work for change.
Second is the social contract which has developed. The
basic concept is that we should leave the political class
to determine all among themselves without any
interference. On its part, the government is to provide us
with our needs from the cradle to the grave.
Two factors result from this situation.
Our economy has changed its structure slowly to a market
economy. However, most of the consumers has still not
grasped the basic principle that prices are determined by
supply and demand and not by government decree. This is
being further complicated by the fact that government and
its agencies are shy to bring this point home. This
contributes to enhance the sense of dependency on
government and its structures.
Anther factor is the duality factor in
our culture. Maltese tend to join organisations which
competes and opposes another. The result is that up to a
certain extend they end up in dividing us rather that
focusing energy to bring about change. Thus the unequalled
thirst for more band clubs in every village. However,
most of the other organisations barely survive.
Fortunately, we believe that this is changing slowly but
surely.
One consequence of the above is our
organisation. Ours is the sole organisation in Malta. We
are fortunate that now most of the major independent
players in the field of consumer protection have joined
our organisation and tend cooperate amongst ourselves.
Being a voluntary organisation gives us independence but
it restricts us in other ways. One inhibiting factor is
that our action is dependent on our free time. Thus the
intensity of activity depends on the commitments of our
active members. Another limiting factor is the financial
aspect. Our revenues depend solely from membership.
Government aid is non existent. In fact we have only been
granted a donation by government twice, one in 1986 and
the other in 1998. In spite of this, my association is
seeing to it that even with its meagre resources, we will
try to employ a part-time worker to boost up our
activity.
Does this mean that we do not have a
role to play in the implementation and improvement of
consumer protection? We are determined that in spite of
all the difficulties, we will have a role in both fields.
With regards to the latter, we will continue to press for
new legislation and structures- legislation and structures
that will answer the needs of the local consumer. With
regards to the former, we will continue to press for full
implementation of our legislation with full
effectiveness.
We have already decided on a strategy.
First since our resources are limited we will prioritise
on the issues that we take up. The main criterion for
determining priority will be the needs of the local
consumer. Secondly, our role will have four components:
representing the consumers, client services, education and
acting as a pressure group. Experience has shown us that
in such a way we would be contribute positively in an
effective and long term manner to safeguard consumer
interests. Certainly we will not conduct our role in a
high profile manner until we can muster the resources that
are needed to sustain and deliver our promises.
Who will be the main targets of our
action? The three main actors who have the power to bring
about change are the Establishment, the consumers
themselves and the business community itself. We will use
our role to influence all three actors.
I believe that we need to split the
establishement into two - the political and the executive
establishment. If we take the first, I tend to get the
impression that we are just tolerated. Except for the
Parliamentary Secretary who is responsible to Consumer
Affairs, I have the impression that the consumers are the
least important factor in their consideration.
Just to give an example. Some months
ago in ........, we wrote to all the Cabinet Ministers
reminding them that we as a registered consumer
association expect to be consulted in matters that
consulted on matters that would affect consumers. The
purpose was to help in the enormours amount of legislation
which was being prepared to have our legislation conform
with the acquis commonautairre. Out of ,,,,
Ministers we received ....acknolwledgements and four
answers. One answer, that of the Minister for Social
Policy was that once the necessary legislation is
prepared, we will be consulted. Two others, one from the
Minister of Education and the other from the Minister of
Health was that we should point out the occasion when we
were not consulted. With regards to the former, once we
had pointed out the area, we did not receive any answer.
With regards to the latter, we were promised that we will
be consulted once the ........... was ready. In the
meantime, from a media report we got to know that the
Minister had consulted the doctors’ union with regards to
the ............ Again we wrote and the answer was that we
will be consulted in due time. The third case was that
regarding the Foreign Minister. We were promised that we
will be invited to take part, like supposedly all the
other NGO’s, in MUESAC - the Malta EU Steering Action
Committee. We were told that we had not been invited
because of an administrative hiccup. However, we recently
learned that since that letter there was another meeting
of this committee. Needless to say we were not invited.
This poses two serious questions to us.
If the government Ministries are reluctant, to say the
least, to accept our offer of help to guarantee that the
consumer always have a fair deal, how much are they ready
to accept our suggestions during implementation stage. The
second problem is, shall we go public and start up a
campaign? Two factors restrict us from taking such action.
First is the fact that we believe that it is better for us
to direct our resources to more effective measures to
enhance consumer protection. We believe that such a
campaign would finally bring the horse to the water. But
the question remains, will it drink it? Second, going
public in Malta will mean that we will be accused of being
political with a capital “P”- something that will deplete
our resources.
This does not mean that we will just
sit and take it. There are other venues which we are
exploring to see that consumers interests are represented
while decisions which concern them are being taken. We are
determined that the right of representation is implemented
in an effective manner. No lip service will deviate our
attention from this goal.
On the other hand, we hope that the
relationship we have with the Parliamentary Secretary
responsible for consumer affairs will continue. In fact,
recently we had written to the Parliamentary Secretary
regarding the implementation of the new legislation which
has recently been enacted by Parliament. We have suggested
that the implementation needs to start immediately in a
piecemeal manner and that we are ready to offer our
suggestions. We hope that our offer will be taken up.
Now we ought to turn to the executive
establishment. We believe that here lays the crux of
implementation. First of all, we believe that because of
the high government economic commitment especially with
regards to the provision of the basic needs, the
department which deals with consumer affairs should be an
independent authority financed by public money and
answerable to Parliament. This has been our stance when
the 1994 legislation was put forward and still is.
In spite of this we are ready to
collaborate with all the government departments with the
intention of implementing the existing legislation. The
existing legislation imposes certain obligations on
government departments. The problem is who is really
supervising that such entities are really carrying out
their work? We believe that here we have a role to play.
In fact, we had already started in this course of action.
I mention one example where we believe we have achieved
the desired effect. In spite that legislation requires
that advertisements on television be clearly marked, we
have noted that abuses are rampant. We took two specific
occasions which concerned the national television station
PBS and reported the matter to the Broadcasting Authority.
The Authority took the necessary action and severely
admonished the station. Once that step was secured, we
asked the Authority to use its monitoring procedures to
include the aspect of consumer protection. We are glad
that the Authority has taken our suggestion on board.
Unfortunately there are other occasions
where the attitude taken by the executive establishment is
totally opposite to that described. Two examples will
suffice. The two occasions concern the Department of
Consumer Affairs. In ....... we were informed of a scheme
which was being directed at certain types of youth. This
was the alpha.com scheme. We noted that the scheme had
many of the characteristics of a pyramid scheme. In fact
later we were informed by the New Zealand authorities that
the scheme was a pyramid scheme and they were taking
action. We notified the department, among other
authorities. Yet no action was taken even though the
department is obliged to investigate any market practice
which may be detrimental to the consumers’ interest.
On another occasion, some of our
members complained that they were being charged prices
which were higher from those shown on the shelves. Again
we informed the department and the only answer was that
complaints about prices are the responsibility of another
department. We answered back contesting the decision taken
but we still have to receive an answer. Such attitudes are
rampant in the other departments as well.
Fortunately we hope that the new
legislation, especially the part regarding injunctions
will be of aid to us to push forward regarding
implementation of our legislation. Whether this
legislation will be beneficial will depend on the
structure which the government will implement. If
government will designate the courts to rule on requests
submitted by any qualified entity, including a consumer
organisation, I think then this legislation will not be of
much use to us. It is a well known secret that going to
our court system for redress means one has to face an
expensive procedure both in terms of money and time.
Unfortunately, as explained at the beginning of my
intervention, we have none of these to spare.
Consequently, this legislation would be a dead letter to
us.
If on the other hand, the authorities
set up an administrative authority to handle injunctions,
things may be different. For example the experience of the
Tribunal for Consumers which is a Small Claims Court is
very positive because it succeeded in cutting both
expenses down. We sincerely hope that the government will
go for such a structure so that we would be able to
participate in the process where we can guarantee the full
implementation of legislation furthering consumer
protection.
We also hope that the monies collected
from orders against losing defendant for payments should
be made into a special fund to be used for the promotion
of consumer associations. This would surely be a sign that
the government is conscious of the need to support our
organisation.
Another
important aspect in our endeavour to see the
implementation of legislation, would be seeing to it that
the consumers and the business sector are aware of the
rights of the former. On our side, we are preparing a
campaign to further consumer awareness of their rights.
Another objective of the campaign will be directed to
indicate to consumers the avenues available to them to
attain redress. The extent of the campaign will depend on
the resources we have.
We believe that
both objectives are essential if we are to undergo a
positive change in consumer protection. Our experience
shows us that awareness is the most important factor to
bring about change. Once consumers are aware, they will
see that their rights are secured and thus they can get a
fair deal without the need for Big Brother continuously
intervening on their behalf. Another aspect of such a
campaign will be to make consumers aware of how markets
operate. This is something that other countries in our
stage of political and economic development are facing. We
hope contacts with other overseas organisation bear fruit
in this direction. Once this is achieved, we can cooperate
in preparing special educational programmes to make
consumers assess the risks they face in different markets.
We feel that this is essential if consumers are to feel
comfortable in operating in markets in an environment
where there is a change in the orientation of
legislation.
In spite of
everything there will always be occasions when consumers
feel that they did not get a fair deal. In such cases
there is a need for redress procedures. We are satisfied
that over the years consumers have learned procedures to
get redress. Previously, the only way most consumers knew
of was to grumble about the bad service the got and do
nothing about it.
However, we are
satisfied because this shows the way to the future. As I
already mentioned, the orientation of legislation is
changing. In the recent past, implementation rested on
government structures. However, as things are changing,
more responsibility is being shifted on to consumers. Our
role in such a scenario will be similar to what had been
in the past - assist consumers get redress on their own.
In future we are confident that we will assist our
community to make this psychological leap to stand up even
for collective rights.
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