Acea crosses arms with Confindustria. The former Roman municipal water and energy company has signed a supplementary agreement that restores article 18 of the Workers' Statute in the version prior to the Jobs Act. A decision that has infuriated the Industrialists' Association.
In detail, That signed an agreement with the sector trade unions of CGIL, CISL and UIL which in point 22 (out of 40) plans to apply to staff in service with contracts with increasing protections and to workers who will be hired in the future "the protections provided for by article 18 of law 300 of 1970, as amended by law 92 of 2012”, i.e. the Fornero reform.
In other words, the changes introduced by the Jobs Act, which introduced compensation instead of reinstatement for unfair dismissals motivated by economic or disciplinary reasons, will not be considered.
However, the version of article 18 that will be applied is not the original one of 1970, but the one modified by Fornero law of 2012, which introduced a first (less heavy) squeeze on the right to reinstatement, replacing it with compensation in economic redundancies and in a part of disciplinary ones.
The secretary of the CGIL, Susanna Camusso, rejoices over the agreement that “abolishes the provisions of the Jobs act” and “opens up a new phase of negotiation. Our objective was to improve working conditions through the reconquest of rights that the legislator, wrongly, considered outdated and useless - continued the trade unionist - Acea has shown courage, but it is not the only one that is moving in this direction, to overcome the system of fear and blackmail introduced by the provisions of the Jobs act”.
The vice president of Confindustria, Maurizio Stirpe: “It is a treasonous agreement of the principles of fairness and loyalty in trade union relations. It appears, given that the Municipality of Rome is the first shareholder, also as an undue interference by politics. This is a serious violation of the principles of fairness and loyalty".
According to the industrialists, the agreement would actually be an electoral provision launched with citizens' money. The reason is that the Municipality of Rome (shareholder of Acea with 51%) is led by the grillina Virginia Raggi and the program of the Movimento 5 Stelle includes precisely the restoration of article 18. Confindustria does not exclude referring the company to the arbiters.
As for Unindustria, the Association of the Confindustria system in Lazio, has requested a meeting with the CEO of Acea, Stefano Donnarumma, and does not rule out the possibility of sanctioning the company, even with expulsion.
Acea, which pays around 100 thousand euros a year to the Confindustria system, explained that in exchange for the concession on article 18 it obtained more flexibility in the use of personnel during emergencies (such as last summer's drought) instead of resorting to external contracts and is therefore “functional to the development of business plan".
