Connect with us

Jobs

25,000 jobs at risk at Stellantis plants in Italy

Published

on

25,000 jobs at risk at Stellantis plants in Italy

Planned job cuts at Stellantis in Italy next year will lead to the destruction of up to 25,000 jobs in car production. This was announced on August 8. Ferdinando Uliano, chairman of the Christian Metalworkers’ Union FIM/CISL, said that Stellantis wants to eliminate at least 12,000 jobs in its Italian plants, and this will also mean the loss of an additional 12,000 to 13,000 jobs at parts suppliers.

The announcement was preceded by a round table (tavolo automotivo) in Rome led by the Minister of Enterprise and Made in Italy (Mimit) Adolfo Urso, who belongs to Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni’s fascist ruling party Fratelli d’Italia (Brothers of Italy). In addition to Stellantis representatives, all three major metal unions—Fiom/Cgil, Fim/Cisl and Uilm—participated. Speaking to Italian TV station La7, Stellantis HR chief Giuseppe Manca said: “Stellantis has communicated to the unions the Group’s plan for Italy, which assigns a mission to each plant by the end of the decade.”

Stellantis Italy was created in spring 2021 through the merger of Fiat-Chrysler (FCA) with the French PSA group (Peugeot, Citroën). Since then, jobs at Fiat have been systematically reduced. Shortly before the merger, Fiat had about 55,000 employees; today there are only about 43,000, of which about 15,000 are in the Turin region.

Stellantis’s plans in Italy are part of a global jobs massacre affecting plants across Europe and the US. “If the brands don’t bring in money, we will shut them down,” Stellantis CEO Carlos Tavares threatened a few weeks ago. For example, another 1,000 jobs at Opel in Germany are in acute danger. Again and again, production is interrupted by phases of short-time work. In Austria, the Opel plant in Aspern was closed last month, affecting 220 employees. In France, Stellantis has cut 600 jobs at its Mulhouse plant.

In the US, 2,450 workers are to be laid off at the beginning of October at the truck assembly plant in Warren, Michigan. Previously, 2,000 temporary workers and hundreds of employees were laid off from other American plants.

The Autoworkers Rank-and-File Committee Network, which is affiliated with the International Workers Alliance of Rank-and-File Committees (IWA-RFC), has called for a counter-offensive by rank-and-file workers in the US. Its statement reads:

A line in the sand must be drawn! Warren Truck is now a critical battleground in the global war on jobs. Autoworkers must make this the start of a broad counteroffensive, counterposing workers’ rights to employment and a decent standard of living against management’s so-called “right” to profit.

Will Lehman, an autoworker and socialist, appealed to workers at Stellantis sites around the world and urged them to take up the fight for jobs together. Will said, “We appeal to our coworkers across the world to join us in a counteroffensive to defend jobs.”

Continue Reading