Unprecedented attacks on Fiat workers

[Hannah Bell]

If Fiat CEO Sergio Marchionne has his way, wages at the Italian auto manufacturer will be equivalent to those in Poland, with working conditions resembling those during the Great Depression.

Last week, the Fiat board announced it would be presenting a new contract for the employees of the entire group. It is based on an agreement implemented in June at the Pomigliano D’Arco factory near Naples and includes longer and more flexible working hours, shorter breaks and a no-strike agreement.

Marchionne justified the radical measures by referring to the dilapidated condition of the factories in Italy and Fiat’s poor stock market results in October. Cutthroat competition and overcapacity in the global auto markets made it a question of survival, he said.

The Fiat Group, which some two years ago took over the US car maker Chrysler, has manufacturing facilities around the world, including in Poland, Serbia, Turkey and Brazil. Fiat makes most of its profits in Brazil, while in Europe it is losing money.

Two weeks ago on national television, Marchionne had threatened to close Fiat’s Italian plants because the company would fare better without them on the world market, he said. A few days later, the Fiat boss said the company would be investing twenty billion euros in the Italian plants in the next five years, at least doubling the production of automobiles. The condition for this, however, was that the unions accepted the radical course he had prescribed.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2010/nov2010/fiat-n10.shtml

[madrchsod]

1. the belvedere,il plant will be making the fiats for the american market

fiat is investing close to billion at that industrial complex.

the most efficient workforce and production line in the usa

[Sherman A1]

2. What I find interesting in this article is the reference to

the dilapidated condition of factories in Italy. Now, just who is at fault for that? The workers..... I think not. Yet, they will get to shoulder the burden of bad management decisions once again.......