On Friday (today), Prime Minister Robert Abela announced that as part of its Budget 2025 measures, the Government will be granting 100 hours in additional leave to self-employed parents who are going through IVF treatment.

This was announced during a pre-Budget consultation meeting with the Chamber of Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (SME) at NM Group in Naxxar.

Elaborating on the measure, Dr Abela stated that mothers will be given 60 hours of leave while the second parent will be entitled to 40 hours. Fully paid additional hours of leave will apply to parents who are both self-employed.

During the meeting the delegation from the SME Chamber discussed its proposals for the upcoming budget.

Dr Abela remarked that SMEs are the backbone of Malta’s economy and stressed the importance of upholding a strong position on competitiveness within the European Union’s Single Market.

“A one-size-fits-all approach is something that we strongly oppose, and our discussion at the European level centres on offering incentive-based policies rather than placing additional burdens on SMEs in order to implement changes,” he continued.

Accompanying the Prime Minister were Deputy Prime Minister Ian Borg, Ministers Clayton Bartolo, Miriam Dalli, and Clyde Caruana, Parliamentary Secretary Andy Ellul and Head of Secretariat in the Office of the Prime Minister Mark Mallia.