Minister Urso accepted the union’s request to take a few weeks to verify further hypotheses of sale and relaunch of Industria Italiana Autobus, working in
synergy with the Emilia Romagna Region, which in turn supported our requests.
As a union we have in fact expressed our opposition to plans for substantial disengagement by the Government, which paradoxically would sanction a squandering of the enormous public resources spent to date. Leonardo and Invitalia must also assume the responsibility given the fact that in recent years they should have created a
positive turn at IIA. And today they cannot shift responsibility onto others. More specifically, the Ministry of Business and Made in Italy had communicated to us its intention to sell Industria Italiana Autobus to the Seri group.
The only guarantee offered would be the preservation of a symbolic shareholding by Invitalia, corroborated by some corporate rights, including that of transferring Seri’s shares to a third party to be identified, in the event that the latter was not able in the future to implement the industrial plan. The Seri group’s plan would include concentrating the Bologna plant on research and development activities and the Flumeri plant on production, an investment with its own resources amounting to 50 million euros, as well as a focus on electric. However, the employment implications are not clear and what is worrying are Seri’s lack of experience in the bus sector and some previous experiences with unfortunate outcomes in the Avellino area.
According to the Ministry of Business and Made in Italy itself, over 200 million euros have been paid into the Italian Bus Industry in various capacities over time, but this has not been enough to avert a state of profound crisis. It was evidently not the money that was missing,
but rather ideas and governance. The only way to avoid sanctioning the squandering of the considerable public resources used and to respect the workers’ struggles is to really try to relaunch the Italian Bus Industry.
Fim – Fiom – Uilm – Fismic – UgIM
