Tourism and hospitality skills pass

Abstract

Over the last few years, Malta has seen one of the most rapid uptakes of foreign labour in Europe. This has led to criticisms by customers of the tourism and hospitality sector that workers are often unable to communicate in either Maltese or English, and know little about the country they work in. Plans were thus announced in October 2023 that all new third-country nationals (TCNs) aiming to relocate to Malta for employment in the tourism and catering industries are to sit for a number of courses prior to entering the country as from 2024. By 2025, all tourism and hospitality workers would require a skills card to work in the industry. This plan was made available for public consultation in 2023, and later became law via the Tourism and Hospitality Skills Pass Regulations, 2024 (L.N. 78 of 2024).

The regulations stated that skill cards were to be obtained by new TCN applicants once the legislation came into effect (March, 2024), were to be obtained by other TCN workers already in the sector by 1st January 2025, and were to be obtained by all workers in the sector by 1st January 2026. No penalty, however, applies to non-TCN workers who do not obtain this.