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5 December, 2002Italy's three metalworkers' unions - FIOM, FIM and UILM - say the automaker's recovery plan is too tough to swallow.
ITALY: Following the collapse of talks on Thursday, December 5, concerning Fiat's massive jobs-cut plan and union refusal of a government compromise, 8-hour strikes have been called for today (Friday, December 6) in all Fiat plants and related companies.
The strikes are the latest in a series of protests over Fiat Auto's restructuring plan in which it has announced it will make redundant 8,100 autoworkers, or one-fifth of its domestic workforce, through a one-year layoff scheme. With the breakdown in the negotiations, Fiat will put in action the first wave of layoffs, affecting 5,600 workers (5,000 in car assembly jobs and 600 in components), as of Monday, December 9.
Expressing the IMF's full solidarity with Fiat workers and their unions, Marcello Malentacchi, IMF general secretary, states in his latest opinion column that the government and Fiat "preferred to send positive signals to the shareholders by implementing a ruthless programme that will throw thousands of workers and their families into poverty." (See the full text of this opinion column on the IMF website under "IMF Opinion".)
One of the auto plants to be hardest hit is in Termini Imerese, on the island of Sicily, where Fiat has long been the mainstay for production jobs, and where unemployment is already at 25 per cent of the working population. As of December 9, 1,800 workers at the Termini plant will be on temporary layoff with minimum pay. After government intervention, Fiat has said the plant would open in January for five weeks, to finish off some manufacturing, but will close again until next September and cannot say how many workers will be needed then.
Fiat workers throughout Europe are organising rallies on December 16 to insist on demands that Fiat invest in development rather than cut jobs.