Sustainable Tourism Law

244 SUSTAINABLE TOURISM LAW (a) when advertising or offering employment or when advertising opportunities for employment or when selecting applicants for employment, to subject any applicants for employment or any class of applicants for employment to discriminatory treatment 14 ; (b) in regard to employees already in the employment of the employer, to subject any such employees or any class of employees to discriminatory treatment, in regard to conditions of employment ”. Besides the definition of discriminatory treatment, this provision further elaborates on the definition of “discriminatory treatment” to include the following: (a) “the engaging or selection of a person who is less qualified than a person of the opposite sex, unless the employer can prove that the action was based on acceptable grounds related to the nature of the work or on grounds related to previous work performance and experience; (b) actions which apply to an employee, terms of payment or employment conditions that are less favourable than those applied to an employee in the same work or work of equal value, on the basis of discriminatory treatment; (c)actions whereby the employer knowingly manages the work, distributes tasks or otherwise arranges the working conditions so that an employee is assigned a clearly less favourable status than others on the basis of discriminatory treatment.” This right is safeguarded under Article 14 of the Maltese Constitution whereby it stipulates that: “ The State shall promote the equal right of men and women to enjoy all economic, social, cultural, civil and political rights and for this purpose shall take appropriate measures to eliminate all forms of discrimination between the sexes by any person, organisation or enterprise; the State shall in particular aim at ensuring that women workers enjoy equal rights and the same wages for the same work as men ” 15 . 14 “discriminatory treatment” is defined as “ any distinction, exclusion or restriction which is not justifiable in a democratic society including discrimination made on the basis of marital status, pregnancy or potential pregnancy, sex, colour, disability, religious conviction, political opinion or membership in a trade union or in an employers’ association”. (Article 2 of Chapter 452 of the Laws of Malta). 15 With reference to this Article in the Constitution, Article 25 stipulates that “The provisions of this Chapter shall not be enforceable in any court, but the principles therein contained are nevertheless fundamental to the governance of the country and it shall be the aim of the State to apply these principles in making laws”.