«We want to have a very strong battle on the issues of internships and apprenticeships. The internship is a piece of the training path not the way to start working, we have to bring it back to its rule, and reform the apprenticeship by putting new money for the first job which must be well paid, and must be longer and more stable, not how it works today ». Thus the secretary of the Democratic Party Enrico Letta responding to the secretary of the CGIL Maurizio Landini on insecurity during the television program “Half an hour more” on Rai three. “It is one of the issues that we want to put into budget law, I put it as a strong flag,” added Letta.
Apprenticeship instead of internships
But what is the scheme that the Dems are working on? The goal is to fight precariousness. And the starting point, as the secretary of the Democratic Party pointed out, is to rethink the internships, which have been transformed from a training tool to the only way to find work. The abuse of internships, is the reasoning, condemns girls and boys to long periods of insecurity. According to the Democratic Party, they must be prohibited, and replaced by an apprenticeship, a tool that on the contrary offers protection and accompanies towards a permanent contract.
First opportunity to propose the Dem recipe: the maneuver
Overall, the proposal of the Democratic Party, which will also be supported in the context of the maneuver that will be defined in the coming days, provides for limits for extra-curricular internships (and therefore stop to unpaid internships in a dignified manner, stop to internships not included in a training course and stop at internships used instead of real employment contracts).
Apprenticeship, new increasing minimum wage
As for the apprenticeship, the Democratic Party is thinking of introducing a new increasing minimum wage (notwithstanding the sector national collective labor agreement), with precise steps for increases. The Dem proposal also provides for the raising and expansion of the obligations to convert the apprenticeship into an indefinite period. The menu also includes total decontribution for apprenticeships which leads to a permanent conversion, the introduction of two additional windows for closing the contract and the creation of a platform to manage all the practices and ensure transparency.