The key points
- Alitalia continues to burn the little remaining cash
- With the latest Covid indemnities (24.7 million) paid the salaries of March by tomorrow
- The EU has rejected the original plan of the new public company Ita
- Now we are discussing the direct passage only of the flight activities to Ita
- There would be the stew, handling and maintenance would be sold to third parties
- The strongest contrast concerns the EU request to sell half of Linate’s slots
- The risk of 7,500 redundancies
Alitalia continues to burn the little cash left, while the tug-of-war with the European Commission on state aid and the birth of the new public company Ita makes no progress. At the end of the month, the company risks putting the planes on the ground and coming to a halt due to lack of liquidity. By tomorrow, employees will be credited with the second half of their March salaries, paid late because the company doesn’t have the money.
Late mini-wages paid by tomorrow
These are mini-salaries, in the first payment many employees received only a few hundred euros, with a minimum of nine euros. The release of the payment was possible with the arrival, on the account of the Alitalia extraordinary administration at Intesa Sanpaolo, of the 24.7 million euros of Covid compensation authorized by the EU at the end of March. These are the latest disbursements of public money that Brussels authorizes. From now on, Alitalia will have to move forward only by its own means, according to Brussels. This is also the line indicated by the Minister of Economic Development, Giancarlo Giorgetti, on behalf of the government.
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Unfruitful confrontations between the three ministers and Vestager
Giorgetti, however, was unable, in the three video connections made in March together with the ministers Daniele Franco (Mef) and Enrico Giovannini (Mims), to obtain from the EU Commissioner for Competition, Margrethe Vestager, the authorization for the rescue plan which provides for the direct passage of flight activities from Alitalia to Ita, the new public company that could count on 3 billion in capital paid by the Mef, to restart the company.
The EU has rejected Ita’s original plan
There are essentially three issues in the negotiations with the EU. The premise is that the offices of the “DG comp”, the Directorate General for Competition in Brussels, since the letter sent on January 8 to the (previous) Italian government, rejected the Ita plan, which provided for a block transfer of all the activities of Alitalia to the new public company, with a substantial halving of the size at take-off: about half of the fleet (52 aircraft instead of the current 104), about half of the employees, 5,200-5,500 compared to 11 thousand. The plan foresaw a growth of the company as early as 2022. Ita expected to start flights from April, but now the flights will not be able to start before July, provided that the operation is authorized.
First point: sale of half of the slots to Linate
The first point of conflict between the government and the EU are the Linate slots, the slots that give the right to land and take off from the Milanese airport. In all decisions on state aid, the EU calls for a cut of the slots. In this case, Brussels would like Ita to give up half of Alitalia’s slots at Linate, the Milanese city airport that now has little traffic, but which in normal times is in great demand by passengers because we are close to the Lombard capital. Ryanair has already asked to have part of the slots that Alitalia should free at Linate. According to estimates, Alitalia holds about 70% of the slots available at Linate. These are valuable rights. The request from the EU is therefore very heavy.