The meeting concluded this morning at the Ministry of Economic Development between Minister Carlo Calenda, Deputy Minister Teresa Bellanova, the commissioners and general secretaries of Fim, Fiom, national and territorial Uilm and CGIL Cisl Uil after Tuesday's meeting on the decisions taken by Commissioners regarding their assessment of the Plans of the two consortiums.
“During the meeting – let the unions know in a note – we asked to be able to continue the discussion on the merits in more detail before proceeding with the award. The Government has declared that, in compliance with the procedure, the comparison can only continue after the award. The union, jointly, has expressed numerous criticisms on the industrial level, confirming its unwillingness to accept layoffs".
"This confrontation - continues the press release - will be decisive in redefining the unacceptable aspects that have emerged up to now, starting with the feared redundancies and in attempting to reach a trade union agreement with the aim of modifying the industrial plan in order to preserve the current employment of the Group and related industries, guarantee environmental sustainability, increase investments and production levels”.
Between today and Monday, mobilizations were launched in all the plants, which will be followed by information and discussion meetings with all the workers on the contents of the plan and our proposed changes.
During the meeting, Minister Calenda specified that every effort is being made not to leave any of the workers at home. The tonnage limit (6 million until the completion of the environmental plan scheduled for 2023) has implications on employment in the first phase of the Plan but we have guarantees on this, if the environmental plan were completed earlier, the Ministry of the Environment would have to intervene to review the plan and timing through legislative intervention.
For the Secretary General of the Fim Cisl Bentivogli "It must be in the interest, not only of the Union but also of the Government, to fully understand whether this investor intends to relaunch or otherwise, in recent years AM while closing all the hot areas of Europe continued to participate in many tenders without ever finalizing purchase proposals. For this reason, it is necessary to understand whether Am is aiming for the industrial relaunch of Ilva or on its market shares (which are, moreover, falling)”.
“There are still too many detailed questions that need to be clarified – continues Bentivogli -, even on the pipe mill plants on which today we learn an investment of 30 million and a forecast of only 440 thousand tons to be produced, then there are the interventions on the trains to be clarified belts, the use of the different AFOs and the anticipated refurbishment of the AFO5, agglomeration, coking plants, infrastructural works. The environmental decree, especially for the climate with which it was born, has too stringent and misleading constraints relating to tonnage (and not to emissions): it is necessary to understand whether the constraint of 6 million tons, in the event of advance interventions from an environmental point of view, may have regulatory commitments to be able to unlock this limit which should be based on the limits imposed on emissions, otherwise all the uncertainty is burdened on the workers”.
“By 5-6 June – concludes the trade unionist – the award must take place in order to be able to stay within the times of the tender and all the necessary technical times. Compliance with the Group's environmental objectives remains binding for us. Subsequently, the investor has 30 days to submit an application in compliance with the environmental plan, another 30 days for an opinion. For this reason we have deemed it necessary to prepare a document to be submitted to the minister with all the aspects that require clarification from whoever wins the tender. The process must be completed by September 30th. The same terms apply to the conclusion of the binding negotiation with ArcelorMittal (unless the latter declares that it does not want to consider it as a standstill clause). The passing of time is a further problem of the negotiations, time that risks losing ground and real space for relaunching and conquering competitiveness and the market. The production of the Ilva Group has dropped to 5,7 million tons”.
