Garrone's letter: a responsible choice to give a strong signal of unity

Dear Colleagues,
when I thought about my candidacy, following solicitations from many, I was clear about the goals that moved us and me. A Presidency at the service of Confindustria and not a Confindustria at the service of the President, a goal that stemmed from the desire to return to the fundamentals of our system of representation and its values, to that spirit that has driven and engaged us for many years, representing interests for the growth of the competitiveness of the Italian industrial system. This with balance and determination, avoiding stimulating internal conflicts that, in recent weeks, months and years, have unfortunately brought out regrettable aspects of our system.

I have imagined and conceived a Confindustria in which the President must never run for external political roles during his term of office, a Confindustria that does not accept exchanges with politics, a strong Presidency with an authoritative and inclusive team that respects the will and resolutions of the Presidency Council and the General Council. A Confindustria that knows how to conquer its role every day, that always knows how to be a cultural vanguard, both within our associative world and externally, that knows how to build the preconditions, for authoritativeness and respect, towards politics and other intermediate bodies, and towards public opinion, returning to the spirit of our founders and the Pirelli Statute. A Confindustria that knows how to give meaning and reason to the rules and statutes that we will define and reform, to be consistent and exemplary, to be the protagonists of a season of reforms, participating in a proactive and effective way in the debate on the economic, social, environmental and cultural future of our country.

Representation is a complex activity that cannot be invented in a day and is not done with approximation or, even worse, with hypocrisy and arrogance that must be combated instead. I imagined a president who respects the autonomy of Sole 24 Ore and recovers the sovereignty of Confindustria in Luiss, being clear about the purposes for which Confindustria considers it strategic to have its own university: to train young talents who have expertise in economic, legal, political and social issues, and who are aware of the importance, particularly for a country like ours, of the value of business and business culture. I imagined that all this should take place with a strong and independent team and a structure of great quality and competence that can flank, and help in their respective roles, the Presidency for the complex choices that we have before us, and that knows how to think big again, ambitious in its goals. Starting with certain topics, such as the economy, democracy, freedom, Europe, with a return to its fundamentals, which are peace, protection and prosperity, reactivation of the social lift in the country, through a great commitment to the training and inclusion of our young people, having clear in mind how, today more than ever, technological, industrial and energy independence is the precondition for the political and economic independence of Italy and Europe.

This is with respect for all of us, because there is no competition to see who among us is 'more manufacturing' than others. Because we must not build castes, but responsible classes that have equal dignity, women and men as equals, where each of our members has the same importance as the others, each of our companies can have the right to representation, in an associative world, ours, that represents the manufacturing industry, but also the tourism industry, services, logistics, just to name a few, that is, all its souls and realities in each of our territories and categories. In order to do so, it is necessary to be consistent and exemplary, between saying and doing, my entrepreneurial and associative history, the values I learnt from my father, as a businessman, and since my attendance at the Young Entrepreneurs of Confindustria, a fundamental experience for me to acquire the tools and skills for representation, require me to put the goals for a strong and cutting-edge Confindustria before my own person and ambitions.

In order to have a strong Confindustria, it is first necessary to put a candidate in a position where he can choose his team and structure freely, without any conditioning and negotiation that would make him weak and sanction his failure from the outset. This condition in my opinion, in the consistency of the purpose that has moved me so far, is only possible in one way. It is in fact evident that strong fractures and tensions have arisen in Confindustria. It is of no use to the Association that one candidate can win by a few votes, perhaps the result of excessive 'commitments or exchanges' that are intolerable and unacceptable to me. Only by supporting a single candidate and putting him in the ideal position in terms of strength and autonomy can we guarantee the best governability for our Confindustria.