Issue link: https://maltatoday.uberflip.com/i/591015
maltatoday, SUNDAY, 25 OCTOBER 2015 News VW - Malta www.volkswagen.com.mt Continental Cars Ltd, Testaferrata Street, Msida | Sales: 23476 315/6/7 | Mobile: 9943 3330 | E-Mail: vw@ccl.mizzi.com.mt Mizzi Motors Showroom, Ghajnsielem, Gozo | Sales: 2155 6942 | Mobile: 9978 2000 | E-Mail: jcassar@mizzimotors.com.mt 5 Year Warranty Parts & Labour 12 Year Body Warranty Students want fast ferry, see 'few job prospects in Gozo' MIRIAM DALLI 84% of 326 students randomly sur- veyed by the Gozo University Group were "keen" to keep using the fast ferry service, compared to the 74% of students who said they are in favour of a subsea tunnel connecting the two islands. The fast ferry service is a proposal the GUG has openly supported for some time. The students also agreed that the EU should help fund the fast ferry project, a smaller alternative to the Gozo Channel ferry. The survey sought to capture the Gozitan students' view on the fast ferry service, European opportuni- ties, job opportunities in Gozo, ac- commodation and the Gozo cam- pus. Students were asked to indicate from a scale of 1 to 10 on how likely they think they could find a job in their area of studies in Gozo. "Quite as expected, a very low 3.28 was the average chosen by students, a con- trast with the average number of 8.2 chosen by students believing that Malta will cater for their future em- ployment," the GUG said. The in-depth survey was carried out together with Pricewaterhouse- Coopers (PWC). Present for the launch of the survey was Labour MEP Alfred Sant, who said that Gozo could benefit from more EU funds that would ensure job opportunities for Gozitan youths in Gozo. Sant said Gozo needed to har- ness its own young talent and work harder to attract new projects to the sister island. "We must reverse the flow of young people seeking to live and work away from Gozo. They need to find jobs in Gozo. Better still, they need to create viable jobs for themselves and others in Gozo. Gozo needs to prospect niches of activities in which young Gozitans can start working on new projects in Gozo itself." Sant said he hoped that the incuba- tion unit being proposed for Gozo would prove to be "a huge success". "Government must make an extra effort in the investment field to mo- bilize even more funds, not necessar- ily a lot, to serve as counterparts in other programmes of the EU, which support new projects." The GUG survey showed that stu- dents (55%) were worried that that the EU was not promoting Gozo enough. "It seems that a lot of Gozi- tan students are keen to leave the is- land in order to further their careers in other EU countries, with 54% stat- ing they would like to develop their careers abroad." Students appeared to be supportive of the Msida hostel proposal, with 76% of the students ranking its im- portance above a 7 out of 10.66% of the students said they would rather study in Gozo if courses were offered at the Gozo Campus. 69% of the students said they would still use the hostel, even if a fast ferry service was available. Only 11% of private school students use school transport TIM DIACONO A mere 2,720 children, 10.8%, out of Malta's 25,184 private school students make use of school transport. Only 14 out of Malta's 80 church and independent schools offer any sort of school transport at all. However, figures tabled in Parliament on Friday by educa- tion minister Evarist Bartolo in response to a question by Labour MP Silvio Schembri show that only 35% of these students are taking up these services. Out of these 14 schools, the San Andrea secondary school in Zebbiegh has the highest take- up rate, with 276 (68%) of its 408 students making use of its school transport services. At the other end of the scale, only 51 (10%) of the 497 students attending the Stella Maris Col- lege in Gzira use the school's pri- vate transport services. The figures are likely to add fresh vigour to the Opposition's repeated calls on the government to subsidise school transport for private school students – as it currently does for state school students – as a traffic alleviation measure. "The tax rebate offered to par- ents whose children use private school transport has clearly not made a difference," Opposi- tion leader Simon Busuttil had claimed at a press conference following the announcement of the Budget for 2016. "The gov- ernment didn't even have the humility to accept my concrete proposal to subsidise school transport for children attending private schools." However, the Malta Teachers' Union believes a far better solu- tion would be for the government to fully subsidise public transport for students. MUT President Kevin Bonello told MaltaToday that parents whose children attend private schools choose to drive them in the morning out of convenience's sake, rather than because they don't view the government's tax rebate as an adequate sweetener. "While state schools only service children from their own localities, private schools incor- porate students from across the island, meaning that their school bus drivers have to pick up stu- dents from widespread areas," he had told MaltaToday. "Therefore, a student from Marsascala who attend San An- ton School could have to spend up to two hours on the school bus as it picks up students from the district, as well as in Cotton- era, and drives to Mgarr. "This means that the child will have to wake up as early as 4am, and it is simply far more conven- ient for his parents to drive him to school." tdiacono@maltatoday.com.mt