It resumed yesterday in Rome, after 10 months, the negotiation for the renewal of the Metalworkers' National Collective Labor Agreement, with two days dedicated to health and safety, industrial relations and participation. A contract that is renewed in a moment of great uncertainty and extraordinary nature.
For the new Fim Cisl General Secretary Roberto Benaglia “the resumption of negotiations with a tight schedule is a good sign to renew the contract, which must be followed by concrete openings. Federmeccanica's declaration of wanting to renew the contract is useful, but it must lead to openings on all points of the union platform. The crisis has shown us how important trade union relations are in the management of the health crisis in companies".
A failed renewal, again according to the leader of Fim Cisl, it would create a vacuum and add further uncertainty that we can't afford. The contract is therefore today more important than ever according to the unions because it is called to restart the supply chains and work within the metalworking sector to overcome the difficult negative situation and manage the great transformation that work is experiencing and on which it is necessary to find solutions contractual.
“On July 30th – added Benaglia – we set an intense calendar that we are called to maintain, we are already 10 months late, we must have the ability to summarize the platform presented in a post-covid period, calibrating it to the new scenario. In this sense, the regulatory part of the contract joins the salary part: raise the protections for those who work and raise wages to better recognize the value of the work, they are the cornerstones of the unitary platform to be implemented in the renewal. Then there is the issue of safety, on which it is no coincidence that we wanted to reopen the negotiation today, a theme which, as we have seen with the pandemic, has been crucial for keeping companies and jobs on their feet, building on the experiences practiced with the comparison and company bargaining. In this sense, the contract must be contextualized but credible proposals are needed, tactics and rituals are not needed, answers are needed, even unpublished and quickly".
