Exploitation of migrants is ‘the rule, not the exception’ – JRS report
“Exploitation of migrants is the rule, not the exception” – JRS report lays bare Malta’s open secret
By the time the Jesuit Refugee Service (JRS) launched its 42-page dossier at the Ħamrun parish hall last night, the room was already thick with stories: a Bangladeshi kitchen-hand who hasn’t seen a payslip in 18 months, a Nigerian carer locked in an attic for 14-hour shifts, a Somali cleaner paid €2 an hour to scrub Paceville clubs at 4 a.m. The report, two years in the making, is Malta’s most comprehensive mapping yet of labour trafficking among migrants and asylum-seekers. Its blunt verdict: “Exploitation is not the result of a few bad apples; it is the orchard itself.”
Local context: a perfect storm
Malta’s 316 square kilometres host more than 27,000 non-EU workers – the highest concentration per capita in the EU. Agriculture, elderly care, construction and the booming iGaming support sectors all rely on cheap, flexible labour. Yet the kafala-style recruitment pipeline, which outsources visas to private agents in Bangladesh, Nepal and the Philippines, leaves workers legally tied to a single employer. “Change jobs and you become irregular overnight,” explains lawyer Carla Camilleri, who volunteers with the JRS legal clinic. “That’s the trap.”
Cultural significance: from “ħaddiem” to “ħaddiema barranin”
Post-war Malta romanticised the Maltese “ħaddiem” – the noble worker who rebuilt the islands’ limestone towns. Today, those same streets are scaffolded by sub-Saharan and Asian men whose names rarely enter the national narrative. “We kept the Maltese worker on a pedestal while building an economy on the backs of invisible others,” anthropologist Dr Maria Grech tells Hot Malta. The report documents 127 cases where employers confiscated passports, a practice the Maltese still associate with Arabian Gulf states rather than their own construction sites. “We’ve externalised the shame,” Grech adds.
Community impact: divided suburbs, shared streets
Take Marsa, where Ethiopian mechanics sleep six to a room above garages, or St Paul’s Bay, where Filipino carers push wheelchairs along the promenade while their own children grow up on video calls. The JRS survey found that 61 % of exploited migrants still send remittances home, meaning every unpaid wage ripples from Qawra to Quezon City. Conversely, Maltese families complain of rising rents driven by overcrowded tenements. “The exploitation economy is inflaming both ends,” notes Labour MP Omar Farrugia, who has tabled a private member’s bill to criminalise wage theft. Meanwhile, parish churches have quietly converted crypts into night shelters; last winter, the Ħamrun soup kitchen fed 1,200 people on Christmas Day, triple its pre-pandemic numbers.
Snapshots from the report
• “Ibrahim”, 29, Ghana: promised €5 an hour in a Valletta restaurant, paid €2.50 and docked €50 every time he took a loo break.
• “Ana”, 34, Philippines: worked 20-hour shifts caring for an elderly Msida couple; her employer threatened deportation when she asked for Sundays off.
• “Raj”, 24, Bangladesh: paid a €7,000 recruitment fee; after a construction accident left him with two broken ribs, his boss cancelled his work permit.
Policy crossroads
The report lands as Malta negotiates a new Migration & Asylum Pact with Brussels. While government sources insist the island “punches above its weight” in rescues, JRS director Fr Jimmy Bartolo SJ counters: “Rescue at sea means little if we push people into bonded labour on land.” Recommendations include a joint inspection task-force (Jobsplus + police + unions), an anonymous whistle-blower hotline, and the abolition of employer-tied permits. The Malta Chamber of SMEs warns of “red tape”, but the GWU has signalled it will back the bill.
Conclusion: beyond charity, towards justice
As the launch wound down, a Maltese grandmother approached an Eritrean cleaner she’d just heard testify. “I never knew,” she whispered, pressing a €20 note into the woman’s hand. But charity alone won’t prune the orchard. Until Maltese employers face the same scrutiny we reserve for smugglers in Libyan waters, the exploitation uncovered by JRS will remain not an aberration, but the blueprint. The report ends with a stark challenge: “Will Malta choose the comfort of denial, or the courage of a fair day’s pay?” The answer will shape not only migrant lives, but the moral skyline of the nation we claim to be.
