The dossier on the former Ilva also enters the Council of Ministers convened at 6 pm but not yet started. In fact, the agenda includes an “information from the Minister of Enterprise and Made in Italy on the agreement to strengthen the production capital of Acciaierie d’Italia” and the decree-law Urgent measures for plants of national strategic interest, with which, in what has been learned, action is being taken on the Taranto steel hub. Also on the executive table is the decree-law Urgent provisions for the management of migratory flows and procedural simplification in matters of immigration, regional laws and any other miscellaneous.
Three thousand cashiers out of 10 thousand
Acciaierie d’Italia, as the company is called today, is about to close the 2022 production balance with around 3 million tons, a figure close to 2020, when there was the peak of Covid and the economy was at a standstill, and a far cry from the 5.7 million that should have been the target. In mid-November and until mid-January, orders from 145 related companies were suspended. In addition, one blast furnace out of three operating has been shut down since July, other plants have also been shut down, and since March, for a year, around 3,000 out of 10,000 workers in the group have been on extraordinary layoffs. Cassa that with the various modalities in Taranto began in July 2019 and has never stopped. And tomorrow the shareholders’ meeting will be convened for the eighth time since November 25, after all the previous sessions have recorded nothing.
Guarantees to the community
“We are of the opinion that a certain approach cannot be perpetrated by the State which finances non-repayable funds, without a guarantee on the prospects for workers and for the city”, said the mayor of Taranto Rinaldo Melucci on Acciaierie d’Italia. “I believe – he added – that so far the private entity has not given any guarantee either to the city, or to the workers, or fulfilled, from our point of view, the things that it had to in some way ensure to the community”.
The defaults
«I say this as a paradox, but the Rivas were gentlemen compared to the Mittals». Rocco Palombella, general secretary of Uilm, runs out of patience when he talks about “how Ilva in Taranto has shrunk since ArceloMittal arrived”. «They put 3,000 people on the payroll, they weren’t able to take advantage of the value of steel increased fourfold. The rolling mills are down, the pipe mills are down, the finishing plants are down. They don’t pay for the gas, they don’t pay the contractors, Afo 5 is dead. Other than a bridging loan, Urso should terminate the contract for non-compliance », attacks Palombella.
«We disagree on a loan granted to Acciaierie d’Italia without any guarantee – added Davide Sperti, Uilm secretary of Taranto -. The only way to change things is to completely change management because that of Acciaierie d’Italia with majority management by Mittal has turned out to be a disaster”.