Former Ilva: companies agree to suspend redundancies

Regarding the permanent round table for Taranto, Mantovano explained that the aim is “to encourage the assumption of shared responsibility, avoiding a fragmented approach and addressing the area’s future through a comprehensive plan. The working group will serve to maintain a constant forum for dialogue in which the Government, local authorities, employers’ organisations and trade unions can follow the proceedings step by step and be kept informed about the activities that each party is carrying out within their respective areas of responsibility.

“The process of convening the round-table,” added Mantovano, “could begin as early as the next few days, not only in view of the Milan Court of Appeal’s ruling on the appeal against the decree suspending operations in the hot area of the Taranto plants, but above all to assess its actual impact on employment and to properly evaluate the options for action, including investment projects in the area”. “For the Government,” Mantovano emphasised once again, “Ilva’s future will in any case be linked to green initiatives and decarbonisation through electric furnaces fuelled by DRI. Should the Court of Appeal uphold the decree suspending operations in the hot area, the Government’s intention is to try to turn a complicated and difficult situation into an opportunity to revitalise the area.”

The first round of talks at Chigi involved the Region and local authorities in Taranto. “We have asked for guarantees for Taranto, which must take the form of a legislative measure: a special law for Taranto. We have called for a halt to redundancy procedures and for the steelworks to remain decarbonised, using electric furnaces, and not just the vertical integration aspect,” said Antonio Decaro, President of the Puglia Region. A plant that does not pollute and does not put the health of the people living in that area at risk.” Furthermore, Decaro added, “We have called for the port of Taranto to truly become a hub for offshore wind power and for the decision that had already been taken to be implemented.” And “we have proposed Taranto as an ‘acceleration zone’ for industrial production on the basis of an EU regulation, and it meets all the criteria. The EU,” noted the Governor of the Puglia Region, “is telling the 27 Member States to identify at least one such area per country, and we believe that the Taranto area is eligible to be designated as an acceleration zone. We have called for targeted and more attractive incentives to encourage companies to set up in the Taranto area, following the example of the JTF, which has already done this. National measures too,’ Decaro went on to argue, ‘must offer greater incentives for companies relocating to Taranto, whilst also providing the possibility of tax relief and multi-year social security contribution relief for those who employ people working at Ilva or in Ilva’s supply chain’.

For the mayor of Taranto, Piero Bitetti, there are three key issues: “Protecting workers, the future of the factory and alternative investments”. Bitetti went on to highlight “the need to protect both direct and indirect workers and to reassure their families”, and emphasised “the urgency of determining what will become of the former Ilva site”. Bitetti then asked: “Support measures for those approaching retirement or for those who have worked whilst exposed to pollutants; a leading role for local authorities in managing redundancies; concrete investments to develop alternative economic sectors, such as renewable energy, which can re-employ the workforce; and the expansion of the port in line with the Mattei Plan”.

The president of Confindustria, Emanuele Orsini, also commented on the former Ilva site. “Today,” Orsini stated on the sidelines of the business mission to Buenos Aires, “the situation is that the hot section has been shut down by the Public Prosecutor’s Office, whilst the cold section has not been shut down. The situation today is that if no consortium steps in to buy the site, it will close. Let’s start by keeping what remains open and then ensure that the hot section can still continue operations later on.” As far as Orsini is concerned, the consortium put forward by Federacciai “is, I believe, a serious one. The Italian Government must do its job: evaluate the two bids and choose the best one. I hope that our side has made a better bid than the others.”

The meeting on 8 September at Palazzo Chigi between the Government and the trade unions regarding the former Ilva ended at around 9.30 pm. It was adjourned for a few days, just long enough to see what the Milan Court of Appeal decides regarding the application to suspend the decree ordering the shutdown of the hot section of the Taranto steelworks, which was adopted by the judicial authorities on 27 July and is due to expire in 90 days, i.e. at the end of October. Depending on the judges’ decision – the hearing is due to take place tomorrow – the ministers who attended tonight’s summit at Palazzo Chigi will set out measures and initiatives for the factory, the workers and the city of Taranto.