Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2004-02-10-Speech-2-319"
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"en.20040210.12.2-319"2
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"Mr President, nine hundred jobs lost may be no more than a statistic, but it amounts to more for the lives of the human beings affected. The plant in Terni is at the very heart of the city’s fabric; 900 jobs: the lives of young and old workers. The steelworks in Terni are the city’s history and pride; they represent the memories of the air raids that took place in the Second World War. When the management of Thyssen Krupp announced the closure of the magnetic steel section, the whole city – as Mr Sacconi said – took to the streets with the workers.
Terni is not an isolated operation: in Europe, Arcelor, Lucchini and Thyssen itself are currently preparing to reorganise production; plants in Belgium, the blast furnaces of Servola in Trieste have already received threats of closure, despite trade union action. Massive disinvestment and relocation of valuable products to non-European countries are in fact destroying European production capacity. Community funds, which have been considerable over recent decades, have been used to dismantle State controlled iron and steel works. The subsidies paid to private entrepreneurs such as Riva, Lucchini, Falk and other foreign groups have been used for the remodernisation of production capacity and the specialisation of the Italian iron and steel industry along profit-making lines.
The European Social Fund and the structural funds have been used to finance restructuring and retraining programmes and have led to a younger workforce being employed in the sector – in Italy today the average age of iron and steel workers is 30 – but it is precisely this new generation of highly qualified young employees whose existence is under threat. In my view, the absence of a coordinated plan in the European Union to relaunch the iron and steel industry has contributed to individual plants in various countries – albeit at the cutting edge – being transferred elsewhere in order to fit in with the industrial plans of individual entrepreneurs.
The Thyssen plant in Terni, which is currently suffering heavy losses in the magnetic steel sector to the benefit of the Russian company Duferco, is cutting back production and preparing to transfer operations to Mexico, Korea, China and India. There is no sign of innovation, new research or competitive challenge: the only thing visible is a dangerous move towards retrenchment which, if not stopped in time, will have repercussions for employment and social cohesion, not just in Italy but throughout Europe. Despite the drastic reduction of employment in the sector in Italy, which has fallen from 100 000 jobs in the 1980s to 40 000 today, the steel sector still has an excellent position in the market because it is the second European producer. In order to maintain that position, however, requires industrial choices to be made by the Italian Government – which do not appear to be forthcoming – and a clear commitment of intent at European level.
Steel and electricity are economic indicators of absolute excellence in a country, a measure of economic development. It is therefore essential that the European Union introduce systems for tackling pollution and monitoring the environmental impact, which are priorities if the aims of the Kyoto protocol are to be pursued. On this basis a new steel industry can be launched. We must find solutions in the form of industrial policies geared to protecting quality products, environmental conditions and employment in the iron and steel sector.
In this sense, in response to threats to employment and gradual social impoverishment, the Commission should give a commitment to review the rules governing the structural funds. Granting of those funds in future should be made conditional on a binding commitment being given to invest in a given location for at least ten years, subject to an explicit agreement that the subsidies will be reclaimed in the event that production is moved elsewhere. In my view, Directive 98/59 on protection in respect of collective dismissals should also be reviewed so as to consolidate the measures designed to protect employment by making provision not only for information procedures for workers’ representatives, but also requiring a commitment on the part of the social partners to open appropriate and binding negotiations with a view to preventing dismissals or the reorganisation of production to the detriment of employment.
The jobs in the steelworks at Terni must be saved, as must the jobs in other Italian and European plants and for this reason I believe that a meeting is required between the governments of the Member States concerned, the social partners and, in this specific case, Thyssen Krupp, to draw up a new industrial plan to relaunch the magnetic and inox sectors at European level."@en1
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