After i 1,500 redundancies announced for Mirafiori and the Turin factories, Stellar takes up the ax again. This time I’m beyond it 2 thousand employees that the Franco-Italian group wants to kick out, mainly concentrated in the factories in the South (Melfi, Pomigliano d’Arco, Termoli). Officially it’s not about layoffs, but “incentivized exits” (like the 15 thousand proposals in November) but it is clear that after months of layoffs and in front of a Uncertain future many “blue collar workers” (but also white collar workers) will prefer to take the incentive and sign their own exit.
Yet another prank from Tavares
This new slimming cure decided by CEO of the group, Carlos Tavares, arrives just on the eve of the resumption of “automotive table” promoted by Minister of Business and Made in Italy, Urso, in order to revive the automotive industry in Italy. The ministry’s declared objective is to return to production in Italy one million cars a year. The minister’s requests were followed by promises from the CEO of the now French-led group on the relaunch of the Italian factories. In reality, in recent months we have witnessed a constant disengagement of Stellantis from Italy. From the factory Maserati of Grugliasco sold on a real estate advertisement site, to the constant use of redundancy payments, to the downsizing of Mirafiori or what was the heart of Fiat, up to the advertisements still on paper for Termoli, the picture is truly disheartening. At Mirafiori they worked until 60 thousand people and from that factory alone one million cars a year were produced: today the employees are just over 10 mila and adding up all the Stellantis factories in Italy we arrive at 5 thousand cars produced.
Investments everywhere, except in Italy
If in Italy we continue with the sole announcement effect, with divestments and with declarations from Tavares that seem intolerable to many (“without incentives we will reflect on the projects”), in rest of the world the ex-Fiat invests record profits in recent years. Türkiye, Serbia, Spain, Poland, North Africa: tens of millions of euros were used to open new factories and produce models that were previously made in Italy. A migration that could lead to halving car production in Italy.