TERMOLI. It’s the theme of the month, if not of the year: the Termoli Gigafactory. The slowdown officially announced by Acc on June 11th, after the rumors published by international press agencies, has thrown the trade unions into turmoil and meetings with employees in the factory are scheduled for tomorrow.
The USB private work, with Stefania Fantauzzi, had its say in these hours on the eve of the internal confrontation at the plant.
«Despite the fact that for more than a year there have been two negotiating tables permanently open (one for Acc and one for Stellantis), in which both the National and Regional Governments act as guarantors, in a completely new way compared to the past, for the ‘obtaining an industrial plan that maintains jobs and production in Italy, we have obtained nothing more than the list of requests made by the confederals, which have remained unanswered. No commitments made.
And while at the ACC table they are discussing the postponement to 2027/28 of a factory that for now does not exist and has not made any hiring commitments even on the first module of just 600 workers, the Termoli workshops are suffering a very rapid compromise.
And despite the two open negotiating tables, we have no certainties…” only rumors”.
What is certain, however, is what we see: in a production situation that was already limping before and regardless of the war and Covid, we now find ourselves faced with real dismemberments. Just over a month ago we closed the two gearboxes C510/520 and M40.
We took them elsewhere. They gave us about 700 jobs. “It seems” that space was urgently needed to build the battery factory.
“It seems” that the V6, a high-end Maserati engine, will be moved to Cento. For now he only works one shift.
“It seems” that by June, the production of the 8 valve engine will be taken away from us, probably outsourced to Turkey. Therefore the 8/16 valve engine workshop will switch to a single work shift from next week. During next year (or before?), they should also remove those of the 16 valves.
The GSE (hybrid) born in Termoli thanks to the first tranche of money from the Pnrr, and which had already been plundered of a good part of its production in favor of Poland, in fact it too is often subject to layoffs, and has never been full capacity.
“It seems” that they will have to stop the current production of the 1500s, in favor of the 1300s… and in the meantime there are rumors that they will stop that workshop too.
It “seems” that they will also have to stop production of the T4 (Giulia engine), since, again “it seems”, that they want to bring a new model to Termoli, but to do so, modifications to the systems are needed. And so in the meantime they would close.
It certainly “appears” that another 200 people who were incentivized last month left, plus another 50 in recent days. “It seems” that in total we have lost 500-600 jobs
It obviously “appears” that the connected services are already suffering from the strong downsizing. Albasan announced 11 redundancies some time ago. The canteen service works a quarter of what it was three years ago. What therefore clearly “appears” is that in the meantime they are taking away… and not putting in! What “appears” sadly is that:
1) the only ambition of the governor of Molise was to get his hands on the tax revenue of the Acc, based in Molise. In the first and only meeting that he also granted to USB more than a year ago, he shamefully asked the unions present not to defend traditional mechanics, because we would have slowed down the arrival of the PNRR money for the Gigafactory.
Here are the results! They are taking away all our jobs!
2) The only ambition of the confederal unions “appears” to be to manage leakages and displacements.
3) The only ambition of the workers seems to be a good redundancy agreement or life-long redundancy fund, or in any case “manna from heaven”, in the hope that “I hope that I can manage”, or even worse, ” your mors, my life”!!
Dear workers, dear workers, what has happened did not happen to us from yesterday to today and it did not happen to us by chance or bad luck… What is happening is what we have not stopped! And those who decided the fate were not those few who, like us, have always fought without your support, but it was all those who stood still and waited thinking that it was not up to you to decide, letting the others decide.
I know I was there with my comrades to try to restore value to the union and to the workers’ struggle for everyone’s rights. Those who weren’t there were you, but all is not lost…
There is still time to stop the machines, the production and everything they take away from our factories… It is time to no longer allow relocations. It’s time to think about some perspective that isn’t just a buffer for the immediate future and only for ourselves… But which will then lead to the whole territory’s defeat.
Let’s form a works council… let’s decide our future. Together.
We at USB propose two hours of assembly immediately, between the first and second shifts in the entrance square of Termoli 1, so that we can all participate, given that the confederal unions prevent us from doing so!»
