The Abi gave cancellation of the national collective agreement of the banks starting from 31 December 2014, but the negotiation - discontinued last November 25th – will be reopened and extended for another three months. In the letter sent yesterday to the unions at the end of the meeting of the Executive Committee, the Association writes that "in the event of no agreement" the contract "will be disapplied from 2015 April XNUMX".
THE POSITION OF THE ABI
In the text, signed by Giovanni Sabatini and Alessandro Profumo, respectively general manager and chairman of the trade union and labor affairs committee, the association reaffirms the "will to arrive at a synthesis between the various positions", recalling how the sector is in a transformation phase characterized "by a serious fall in profitability" and by "innovations in place on the regulatory and technological side". Profumo and Sabatini therefore underline that the new contract must "reflect the structural changes taking place in the sector and the progressive differentiation of organizational models".
According to the ABI, "the objective is therefore to enter into an agreement which, from a sustainability perspective, can reconcile the need to recover profitability and increase productivity at company and Group level with the protection of wages from inflation and support for employment, with particular attention paid to more incisive measures on the front of youth work”.
The cancellation of the contract "takes place at the end of the year because it was no longer possible to go ahead with the extensions - Profumo explained -, but we will not disapply it until March 31, with the will, not at any cost and not at any price, to arrive upon conclusion of the new contract. The fact that we have another three months to discuss, I think, is extremely important, knowing that it's been three months and it's not more”.
THE REACTION OF THE TRADE UNIONS
According to Lando Maria Sileoni, general secretary of Fabi, the majority trade union of bank workers, "the Abi is afraid of taking responsibility for a rupture due to exasperated and intransigent positions in the face of the political class and public opinion compared, for example, to the severance indemnity, to seniority increases and to the employment stability of the 309 workers in the sector and to youth employment policies. The ABI note released yesterday speaks of the loss of profitability of the banks and of new technologies that are looming: we reply that there are managers in the banks who are handsomely paid to find organizational solutions and not to unload the problems on the shoulders of the workers”.
The trade unionist argues "that the banks' claim is all of a political nature and the rumored reduction in costs represents exclusively an alibi to obtain, instead, the deconstruction of the national contract and the employee paychecks. The workers' assemblies will begin shortly, and they will surely understand the dangers of this attack on their rights without precedent in the history of trade union relations in the sector”.
For Massimo Masi, number one at Uilca, “by blocking seniority increases and reducing severance pay, it is precisely the young people who are going to be hit. And let's take into account that already today new hires have a salary 18% lower” than the contractual minimums.
THE THEMES OF THE COMPARISON
Last year the category went on strike again after 13 years and a new mobilization is expected at the end of January (probably on the 30th). So far, the negotiation has recorded only one step forward: since prices do not grow (indeed, some cities are in deflation), workers have reduced their claims for adjustments in payroll from 175 to 130 euros. But we are still very far from the agreement, given that the banks do not intend to go beyond 53 euros gross per month. Other issues at the center of the comparison are the seniority increases, the mechanism for revaluing the severance pay, the contractual area and the classifications.
