As part of the European network, Volt Malta follows a pan-European approach to many policy areas such as climate change, migration, economic inequality, international conflict and the impact of the technological revolution on the labour market. In addition, the party has set out to address a wide range of issues in Malta, such as corruption through the promotion of transparent governance and separation of powers, or environmental and climate protection, through an emphasis on a circular economy. Language courses and courses on European cultural and civic norms are to be promoted for refugees and asylum seekers.
Health & Social Policy Volt is committed to sexual & reproductive rights and calls for the decriminalization of abortion and the classification of all contraceptives as essential medicine, making it the first
pro-choice party in Malta. The group also emphasizes this with #IneedMAP!, an initiative to improve access to the
Morning After Pill (MAP), pharmacies were mapped that sell the MAP. In vitro fertilisation should be legal and carried out with genetic tests to rule out diseases in advance. In October 2021, Co-President Alexia DeBono criticised even
Netflix's show
Sex Education for providing better
sex education than the current curriculum and called for a fact-based curriculum and sex education free of doctrine that empowers young people to make informed choices and discover themselves in an open, stigma-free environment. Sex education should be guaranteed at state, private and church schools, regardless of the type of school.
Period poverty is something the party wants to fight and advocates for free menstrual products in educational institutions, public health facilities and hospitals, food banks, prisons, homeless shelters and public toilets and menstrual products to be covered under the 0% VAT regime. Health workers are to receive a salary supplement for work done during the pandemic. Volt advocates for the
legalisation of cannabis and called for a more progressive reform than before. The party proposes a limit of 25 grams for personal possession and use.
Addiction should be treated as a medical problem, not a criminal one. To this end, instead of a cannabis authority as planned so far, an authority for recreational drugs should be established to enable studies and guidelines for different drugs and to better combat the
black market. The party brought its proposals on this to the White Paper process to develop guidelines for dealing with drugs in Malta. The
minimum wage in Malta is to be increased to €1,100 by 2025, based on the European Commission's recommendations of 60% of the median wage in a country. To ensure the right to a living minimum wage, a Living Wage Unit is to be established within the National Statistics Office, responsible for the regular calculation of the living wage. Parents should be entitled to 20 weeks of fully paid
parental leave, regardless of their gender, sexual orientation and whether they choose
adoption or
surrogacy. In doing so, the party aims to advance gender equality and combat discrimination by employers. The party supports making
femicide a separate criminal offence and including it in the Criminal Code. The party wants
sex work to be regulated. Volt proposes to impose prison sentences on illegal brothel operators and human traffickers and to create support services for people who are forced into prostitution.
Sex workers should also be allowed to register and brothels should only be organised as cooperatives to prevent
procuring. Sex workers should be over 21, clients must be at least 18 to be eligible for appropriate services, and unprotected sex should be banned, as well as regular
STD testing becoming mandatory. Volt distinguishes between three forms of
euthanasia: passive euthanasia, assisted suicide and active euthanasia, the latter whereby the party rejects the last and proposes accompanying measures and counselling services.
Transparency and governance Volt Malta supports the European citizens' initiative "Voters Without Borders", which calls for voting rights at local and national level for EU citizens as well. If the initiative is successful, it could give them access to foreign voters who currently cannot vote in general elections and do not identify with the
Nationalist Party or the
Labour Party. As part of the party's efforts for more transparency in party finances, the group launched a campaign, #PolitikaOnesta, which provides users with a breakdown of party advertising spending over periods ranging from one day to 90 days. The party demands that all finances of a political party should be governed exclusively by the party financing law and not by a mixture of party financing law and corporate law. Volt demands that the
ONE and
NET television channels, owned by the Partit Laburista and Partit Nazzjonalista parties, should no longer be regulated under
company law, as they can be used to circumvent party funding rules and disguise donations. The party also criticises the broadcasters for receiving financial support during the Covid-19 pandemic, thus providing state funding to the parties behind them with taxpayers' money, which is not otherwise common in Malta. A fixed term of office should be introduced for the parliament. A non-governmental body is to conduct an audit and performance review of the entire public sector and publish the results. As a follow-up, a government digital dashboard of expenditure is to be developed.
Economic policy To promote
small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and
startups, Volt supports an orientation toward the New Zealand model with incentives for reinvestment of profits, creation of new jobs, and greater support for digital infrastructure. By promoting an accredited network of venture capital firms and angel investors, it aims to increase the amount of venture capital and make it more transparent. The aim is to make it easier for companies to start up and grow. The establishment of companies is also to be supported by setting up
business incubators.
Cooperative law is to be modernised to make the economy more crisis-proof. Tourism is to be geared more towards quality and move away from a focus on short-term visitors. To this end, the party wants to open up North America as a new market and attract people of Maltese descent as a target group. This, along with a diaspora passport, is intended to attract foreign direct investment to Malta. The party proposes the promotion of
vertical agriculture,
agricultural technology and
robotics industry to diversify the economy and the research sector for sustainable economic growth. The economy on
Gozo is to be made more independent, especially through the promotion of agricultural technology. The transport sector is to be redesigned to reduce emissions. To this end,
pedestrian zones are to be promoted and town centres are to be made more pedestrian-friendly and barrier-free.
Cycling is to be supported by structurally separated
cycle paths, concepts for bicycle sharing and the expansion of bicycle parking spaces. In addition,
public transport should be promoted by setting up a 24/7 bus system and expanding
night bus services. A one-ticket system is intended to promote the switch to public transport. == Elections ==