27 Novembre 2012

Under the auspices of the Government, Italian trade unions and employers’ associations have reached an agreement that will significantly contribute to increasing productivity and employment, by providing for labour contracts that better reflect the needs of individual companies.
The “Guidelines to increase productivity and competitiveness in Italy” set out a number of new principles governing industrial relations and the wage-bargaining process. National collective bargaining agreements  will continue to ensure a minimum reference wage common to all workers that is consistent with specific economic sector trends, but without any form of automatic indexation. Currently nationwide collective contracts are indexed to inflation, excluding energy prices.
The Guidelines allow a portion of the wage increases agreed at national level to be managed by second-level collective bargaining to promote rises in productivity. They also  identify specific aspects relevant for productivity, and normally regulated by law, that  the social partners will be able to regulate. These include the number and flexibility of working hours, workplace arrangements and the possibility to change with greater flexibility the tasks assigned to a worker, including a possible transfer to equivalent tasks as a result of restructuring or technological innovation.
Furthermore, the Guidelines put a strong emphasis on local-level contracts (“second-tier” contractsfor small-and-medium sized companies ), which gives employers greater flexibility to set working hours, place and other arrangements in a way that reflects their needs and situation.
To encourage the shift from national to firm or regional level contracts, the government has set aside €2.1 billion in the draft Stability Law for 2013-2014 to cover for reduced taxes on productivity-linked wage increases set at local level. The reduced tax will apply to annual gross salaries only in case of agreements that have enabled measures to increase productivity.
In this way, local collective bargaining will become the norm, better reflecting the reality of the sector nationally and internationally.
The document also paves the way for a better pact between generations allowing for senior workers to stay at work longer by being more mobile internally, including by opting for part-time tutorial tasks, which will smoothen the transition from work to retirement and increase the employment of young workers.
Finally, the document addresses other important issues, such as the rules concerning the representativeness of trade unions, the information and consultation of workers, training and employability of workers.
The agreement is an important step in re-launching productivity and increasing the external competitiveness of Italy. it will support the continuing expansion of exports – Italy has a trade surplus and a nearly-balanced current account position  - thus contributing to macro-economic rebalancing. It will provide for an environment more conducive to higher employment and sustained wage increases. It complements and further enhances the Government’s broader action to lift Italy out of the crisis through structural reforms.
This agreement is “very important because it deals with a long-standing problem in the Italian economy that is low or falling productivity thereby laying down the conditions for an increase in competitiveness, ” Pier Carlo Padoan, Chief Economist of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development told Radiocor.
The agreement reached by the social partners responds to the European Union recommendation of June 2012 to monitor and, if needed, reinforce the implementation of the new wage-setting framework introduced in 2010 in order to contribute to the alignment of wage growth and productivity at sector and company level.
The Guidelines were signed by the Confederazione Italiana Sindacati Lavoratori (CISL), the Unione Italiana del Lavoro (UIL), the Unione Generale del Lavoro (UGL) and all employers' organizations: Confindustria, Associazione Bancaria Italiana (ABI), Associazione Nazionale fra le Imprese Assicuratrici (ANIA), the Lega Cooperativa and Rete Imprese. One of the trade unions, CGIL so far has declined to sign. While this does not affect the validity of the agreement, the government strongly hopes that all trade unions will implement the agreement, as it is convince it is in the interest of all workers.
The Government will set out in a ministerial decree, to be adopted by the end of the year, the detailed conditions that will give rise to the reduced taxes on productivity-linked wage increases.