Automotive, Guidesi appeals to the EU to save the sector

(Il Sole 24 Ore Radiocor) - The defence of the automotive industry, of companies in the sector and of jobs was at the centre of the speech by the Lombardy Region's Councillor for Economic Development, Guido Guidesi, at the plenary session of the Committee of the Regions in his capacity as chairman of the Automotive Regions Alliance (Ara). Guidesi was back in Brussels to promote to the European Commission and Parliament the call for consideration of the crisis situation in the sector, which currently sees 75% of the production capacity of European manufacturers and their supply chain at a standstill, with the dramatic prospect, at continental level, of losing half a million workers in the next few years. Guidesi, who since January has been the head of the Automotive Regions Alliance, i.e. the alliance of the most important 36 European regions in the sector, emphasised the European Union's responsibility with regard to policies that have identified the electric motor as the only way to implement the ecological transition. Guidesi reiterated that this was a choice that represented an assist for non-European competitors and the Chinese industry in particular: 'The automotive industry is what best represents European integration and the foundations on which the European Union is based. There is no region in Europe that has not dealt with it. Paradoxically, it is the European Union itself, through the Commission, that has brought it into crisis. The Chinese have been developing electric batteries for years and thanks to the resounding European assist they have turned their peculiarity into a business opportunity in a sector that they had never before tackled.

In light of these considerations, a request for a change of pace has arrived at the European Commission. For the Lombardy councillor and president of the RAF, the corrective measure announced in recent weeks by the head of the EU executive, Ursula von der Leyen, is not enough: 'We need a radical change in the regulation and the path taken with respect to calculating emissions, we need to give our industry back the possibility and the economy to be able to resume making the best cars in the world'. Lombardy's thesis, shared by the main stakeholders in the sector and the regions that are members of ARA, is to focus on technological neutrality, i.e. on the need to achieve environmental objectives through all the opportunities offered by technology, from hydrogen to biofuels, from biomethane to synthetic fuels, without limiting the choices to electric cars. "Converting refineries into bio-refineries to produce the biofuel that powers a car or commercial vehicle with an endothermic engine is an excellent environmental operation that significantly lowers emissions. You cannot limit research and technological innovation by imposing a one-way street, so innovation stops, so environmental goals are not met, so the industry goes to others and our industry is wiped out. Added to all this are the US duties just confirmed by the Trump administration and energy costs, further factors that harm us from the point of view of competitiveness,' said Guidesi, launching a heartfelt appeal to the EU Commission and Parliament: 'It is more necessary and urgent than ever to cancel nonsensical deadlines and give back freedom of action to industry with respect to what to offer the market in full 'technological neutrality'. We must simply tell citizens that they can do as they please as long as they do not pollute. And we must give all European citizens back the chance to be able to afford a European car'.

Moreover, Guidesi reiterated the willingness of the ARF regions to work with the Commission to implement pragmatic solutions aimed at saving the automotive sector: 'We need to correct mistakes and look to the future, averting what is shaping up to be the greatest economic suicide in the history of industry,' continued the councillor, one of the promoters of the Manifesto signed by essentially all the main stakeholders in the sector and which has become the official document of the automotive regions. The text reiterates the need to take the path of technological neutrality in order to reverse course and preserve what for decades was the continent's largest industry and the first to have a complementary supply chain spread across the various European states.