A clash between the Welfare Minister and the heads of CGIL, CISL and UIL over Article 18 of the Workers' Statute is the last thing the country needs. Yet the tension between Elsa Fornero and the trade union organizations is palpable and it would be a mistake to underestimate it. So let's see the matter of contention trying to simplify as much as possible. The minister said that we cannot do without addressing the problem of the labor market, that there is the question of precarious workers and youth unemployment, that we can and must aim for a single contract, providing for social safety nets and guarantees not just for the already employed.
Then he evoked the Scandinavian model of "flexsecurity", he added that he wants to discuss these things with the trade union organizations and that the discussion must be across the board, including, if necessary, also the matter regulated by article 18, which must not be taboo. The reaction of the trade union organizations was very harsh. Cisl secretary Bonanni said that even his uncle, who knows nothing about economics, could take the measures contained in the maneuver. The leader of the CGIL, Susanna Camusso, said that "the government is talking about labor reform, but in reality it is announcing easy layoffs" and that "article 18 is a rule of civilization that prevents discrimination".
Equally harsh was the reaction of the minister who said she was sorry and worried "for a language that I thought belonged to a past of which we cannot be proud". Both Fornero and Camusso, as we can see, don't mince words. After all, the Minister of Welfare loves to use (and I think it is an act of respect for his interlocutors) a language of clarity and truth. To say article 18 he does not use periphrases. He says 18 and not 17 and a half or 19 less. In turn, Camusso carries out a difficult job, that of secretary of the CGIL, and she knows that she cannot afford to be overtaken on the left by other organizations, and that on certain subjects (rights) it is not possible to step back.
Hence the harshness of the languages. Harshness that however must not and cannot compromise a negotiation, more than necessary, indispensable. A negotiation that can certainly touch upon article 18, but that does not end there. Because it has to address the issue of work as a whole, with particular reference to the new and less protected social categories: those of the precarious and the young unemployed. And here comes an old problem for Bonanni, Camusso and Angeletti: do their organizations want to have the entire world of work as a reference, therefore also the precarious and the unemployed? Or do they want to be above all the union of their members, made up mostly of already employed workers and pensioners (with wages)?
This is the dilemma that Fornero poses to Camusso, Bonanni and Angeletti. The same thing that a great reformist thinker like Gaetano Salvemini posed, arguing with Filippo Turati, to the trade unions of his time, accusing them of mainly serving the interests of the already employed in the North, rather than the unemployed in the South. Naturally there is no doubt, and Camusso is right to ask the question, it is clear that the aspects of civilization (precisely those of preventing discrimination among workers, perhaps due to their union membership) can and must in any case be protected during the negotiation. Whether or not Article 18 is touched upon.
