Opinion • March 7 2004

Equality on paper

Dr Anna Mallia points out how the law stinks in its implications for women and has a clarion call for women’s organisations and women generally

Tomorrow is Women’s Day. In Malta Women’s Day is more synonymous with the past than with the present and future. It is like celebrating a national holiday like Independence or Republic Day when much talk is made on how we got there rather than on how do we go from here. And the sad thing about it is that women and women organisations acquiesce to all this.
Equality between men and women in Malta exists on paper. Our Constitution provides for equality between the sexes. Our Civil Code has partially amended the anomaly that existed between men and women. I say partially because the law on inheritance is still sexist in favour of men. We have, on paper, told our women that they are equal in the eyes of the law because their signature is needed together with that of the husband in the purchase, sale and burdening of their communal property.
However little did we tell them about the consequences of such signature and that there are other mechanisms in the law that can do away with it.

The Community of Acquests is in crisis
It is a fact that the community of acquests is in crisis. Although on paper we say that all debts and profits from day one of the marriage belong in one money-box, in effect our manly parliamentarians are day by day eroding this system by introducing special legislation which allows only for the signature of one and not of both parties to the marriage. So much so that they have rendered the community of acquests applicable only to the debts and not the profits of the community of acquests.
In my experience in matrimonial cases I experience the hardship that married women go through because the law that is supposedly to be equal between the sexes is causing gender inequality. These are few examples of how this is happening:

• Bank accounts opened during marriage in the name of one spouse are confidential and can only be divulged to the other spouse if authorised by the court. The wife has to go through the humiliation of asking the permission of the Court to know her share of the money was deposited by her husband in a bank. Either spouse can open and close bank accounts without the consent of the other party.

• Companies can be registered by either spouse without the other’s consent. The company can trade and enter into debts and the accounts of the company are accessible only to the shareholders and directors of the company. The other spouse who is not a party has no say in the matter although the value of the shares belong jointly to the spouses. Again, the accounts of the company can be made available to the other spouse with the authorization of the court.

It is a fact that women who did not have a good marriage and whose husbands have transferred everything to a limited liability company are experiencing great hardship in that they cannot enforce any judgements regarding maintenance and regarding their share of the community of acquests. Ask these women and their children how they are living from hand to mouth while their husbands live in the luxury of boats, cars and girls.

• Loans or overdrafts of the companies are usually secured by the personal assets of the shareholders. The other spouse is called in because the personal assets belong to the community. The other spouse binds himself/herself in solidum with the company for the repayment of the facility little knowing that with that signature she is entrusting her property in the hands of the company. However, such spouse has no say in the disposal of the loan or the overdraft. She is not allowed to know how money was spent by the company of her husband, but she is definitely informed when the company does not honour the agreement, as the banks are unscrupulously selling her property and not of the company. Why? - because the agreement gives them that discretion.

• Families are being left without the supply of electricity because the spouse on whose name the meter is registered fails to pay the bills. The stand taken by Enemalta that the service will not be transferred to the other spouse unless the consumer pays the outstanding bills is deplorable.

• Maintenance for the wife and the children cannot be enforced by the wife when the husband is self-employed or is employed by his company. I invite anyone to come to Court and experience the pain and humiliation these women and their children go through when with no money they have to beg to the Court to allow them to take the money for their and their children’s survival from the moneys held by the husband, when this is the case, or to order the sale of the property held in common so that they can feed their children.

However, the Court has so far refused to order the sale of any property held in common for maintenance purposes and it is helpless when all the moneys and other assets are held in the company of the husband.
Maintenance by law is till the age of 18. It is so unfortunate that many fathers whose marriage is in crises are reluctant to help their children in their studies beyond that age thus forcing our children to leave school. I have had two cases this year already when children who were attending university courses had to leave because of the financial constraints caused by the selfishness of the father.

• The law of VAT, on social security, on insurance, on visas to foreigners, on vehicle registration, and the labour laws, among others, are all working to the detriment of women. Women are registered with the department of VAT even though they are housewives or employees and not in charge of the business. There is still discrimination against women in the law on social security. Insurances and licenses are granted and transferred or withdrawn without the consent of the other spouse. Only the signature of the husband is requested by the immigration authorities as a guarantor for the issuing of visas to his girls or girlfriends.
You may argue that there is no discrimination in all this because what applies to the husband applies to the wife. But the fact in issue remains that since the majority of the Maltese married women stay at home because there are no child support services for those who embark on a career, they are the ones who are being affected most.

Trust is not a virtue
Women who have devoted their life to the family and are, all of a sudden, facing separation know what I am writing about. Those who have trusted too much have no means to fight for a good and reasonable separation agreement, notwithstanding that there may be assets in the community of acquests.
I have endlessly aired my concern about this. But all the women supposedly in power, the women organisations, the political parties, the Commission for the Advancement of Women, the Commission for the Family, remain numb. May I again appeal to them and to the newly appointed Commissioner for Children and Commission on Gender Equality to take the matter seriously so that the present threats to the community of acquests are abolished and re-institute the principle of community of acquests as the law prevailing above all the rest.