Italy’s Fiom labor union calls for strike against Fiat
Italian financial newspaper Il Sole 24 Oro says the powerful Fiom metalworkers union is calling for a one-day strike at Fiat plants and a national demonstration in Rome on October 21. The union says the action is to protest the automaker’s plans to move more production out of the country.
The trigger was Fiat’s decision to leave Confindustria, an Italian employers’ group, which the union sees as a sign Fiat plans to relocate. Last week, Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne sent a letter to Emma Marcegaglia, head of Confindustria, explaining that recent accords between the management group and unions were not in Fiat’s best interests.
Marchionne has long complained that labor practices have made Italian factories less productive than operations in other countries. He has made a multi-billion-euro investment program for Italian plants contingent on union acceptance of new rules. Most of the unions have accepted new contracts but Fiom has fought bitterly against them, even attempting to have a court declare them void.
Maurizio Landini, Fiom’s secretary general, also accuses Marchionne of devoting more attention to Chrysler than to Fiat.
Fiat already has said it would produce a small Jeep-branded SUV and the Alfa Romeo MiTo at the Mirafiori plant in Turin. A new Alfa Romeo engine also will be developed in Italy.
