(Updated at 9,00pm) Alitalia, the comment from the Minister of Development Carlo Calenda arrives at 3 in the morning on Friday: «The parties signed a report of discussion which shows the structure of a possible improvement agreement (compared to the original industrial plan, ed) for the number of redundancies, for outsourcing, for salary cuts". "The unions - he added - have reserved the right to hold a referendum as early as next week". Among the measures envisaged are the reduction of redundancies among permanent shore personnel from 1.338 to 980 and the reduction of the salary cut to 8%. The minutes will be signed after the referendum among the workers.
In the text, described by Ansa, in addition to the reduction in redundancies and the minor cut in salaries for flight personnel, the need to accelerate the growth of revenues is highlighted, in particular by introducing new long-haul aircraft.
As for the redundancies, the reduction takes place through: overcoming the outsourcing project in maintenance areas and other areas; recourse to cigs by May 2017 for two years; the activation of retraining and training; measures of incentive to leave; improvement of productivity and efficiency with referral to the company by May 2017 for definition.
As regards the flight crewthen the following are foreseen: three-year seniority increases with first shot in 2020; salary increase cap in case of promotion equal to 25%; for new hires application of the Cityliner contract; reduction of annual rest periods from 120 to 108; incentivized exits of pilots and flight attendants; continuation of solidarity until the deadline set by law, 24 September 2018.
Furthermore, the report states that: the company is going through an economic-financial crisis, that a group of shareholders and lenders is proposing a recapitalization of the company for approximately 2 billion, of which 900 as new finance, that the BoD has approved a plan which envisages growth in revenues and a significant reduction in costs, of which about a third refer to labor costs, that the injection of financial resources is preparatory to the relaunch of the company.
It is the conclusion of the night marathon during which the president of the company, Luigi Gubitosi, led a tough but apparently decisive confrontation with the representatives of CGIL, CISL and UIL supported by the autonomous trade unions. The agreement now hangs by the thread of consultation with Alitalia employees before it can be declared definitively approved. The industrial plan launched by the top management of Alitalia (49% owned by Etihad) envisaged heavy sacrifices for the workers: government mediation, in the late afternoon, comes to file redundancies, layoffs (cigs) for 24 months for about 980 workers (at the beginning there were more than two thousand), in addition to the non-renewal of fixed-term contracts for 558 employees and the departure of another 142 abroad. The negotiation runs aground on the cost of traveling personnel. The average wage cut proposed by the company is 14%, with fluctuations of 22% for long-haul pilots, 28% for medium-duty pilots up to 31% for flight attendants. "Unacceptable" hypotheses for the leaders of CGIL, CISL and UIL, Susanna Camusso, Annamaria Furlan and Carmelo Barbagallo. So we started from here, now the solution could have reached the final turning point.
"We are satisfied with the work obtained: redundancies have dropped a lot, also because greater investments have also been made in the industrial plan, with more aircraft and maintenance remaining within the company, and we believe we have reduced wage cuts to a minimum", he comments The Transport Minister Graziano Delrio. The minister Calenda in turn underlines that "if the operation were to fail all the costs would go to the State", and it is a question of "more than one billion". For the unions, Camusso (CGIL) underlines that “the referendum will be binding” e Furlan (CISL) that "we brought home important results, this was the maximum limit we could reach". Agree Barbagallo (Uil).
