Here are news, exaggerations and fake comparisons on the government-trade union agreement in the public administration
The analysis of Nunzia Penelope, deputy director of the Work Diary
What does the agreement signed this week at Palazzo Chigi between the Draghi government and the CGIL, CISL and UIL on Public Employment have to do with that of 1993 between the Ciampi government and all the social partners? Virtually nothing, even if in recent days there has been a lot of insistence, especially in the media, in proposing one as a model for the other. But it is definitely a stretch.
The agreement, in fact, is a framework agreement based on the reform of the public administration; although fundamental, nothing comparable with the 1993 protocol, a broad and detailed, far-reaching text, which defined the rules of the game between the government, trade unions and Confindustria and laid the foundations for the income policy of the years to come. What would later be defined, with a word, concertation.
Furthermore, the agreement with Ciampi was triangular, that is, it also involved companies, while the agreement signed today is between only two parties at stake: the government, as an employer of the public sector, and the trade unions. Both agreements were signed in the Green Room of Palazzo Chigi, a symbolic choice, of course, but not sufficient to unite them.
“It's just the beginning”, Mario Draghi himself said, warning that “this signing is certainly an event of great importance, it is the first step: but much, if not almost everything, remains to be done. There is really a lot to do, ”he stressed.
Despite Draghi's understatement, it was nevertheless chosen to give this agreement a specific weight that goes beyond its own contents. A symbolic value, therefore, first of all because this agreement on public work represents the first act of the government's economic policy, and then because it had been several years since the unions in Palazzo Chigi had not set foot, due to the tendency of the Conte 1 and Count 2, to do it by itself.
There was, in truth, in spring 2020, the signature on the protocol for safety in the workplace, a precious text that allowed Italy not to completely stop its activities due to Covid. But even in that case it was an agreement between only two contractors: Confindustria and trade unions, with the Government in the role of witness, or at most notary. No triangular concertation.
The agreement presented with all the necessary honors is therefore a strong symbol, above all because it serves to demonstrate the government's will to re-establish a true, concrete, constructive relationship with the social partners.
Not surprisingly, starting from the public sector, land on which the trade unions had many problems with those who preceded Renato Brunetta at Palazzo Vidoni (Fabiana Dadone, now moved to youth policies), so much so as to call a public strike employment last fall.
Today the Draghi government picks up the pieces of the relationship that was interrupted, or never started. And it is also very significant that it is Renato Brunetta who sanctioned peace: that is, the one who in another world, in another era, with his public administration reform, launched with the slogan "war on idlers", had created not a few tensions in the sector. It remains that for now the agreement is only a framework, which will gradually have to be filled with contents. And in fact, from Friday the real negotiations will begin, the one with the sector unions, to define the renewals of public contracts, hiring, competitions, and everything else.
It must also be said that the agreement excludes a part of the unions, or the autonomous ones, not summoned to Palazzo Chigi together with the three confederations, despite having a certain weight in the public sector. It is precisely in the desire, let's say, not to have them in the middle, someone explains the absolute secrecy with which Palazzo Vidoni and the confederal centers of Cgil Cisl and Uil have worked in recent weeks to finalize the text of the agreement.
Furthermore, the limited nature of the agreement, which is limited to the public sector, probably also reflects the will of the CGIL not to get involved in an all-out negotiation. Maurizio Landini has repeatedly explained that he prefers a series of agreements on single issues: today public work, then social safety nets, taxation, and so on. This is also a significant difference from the 1993 agreement, which, in fact, dealt with a vast set of issues, all closely linked to each other by a single thread.
In short, is there therefore nothing that brings the Draghi 2021 agreement closer to the 1993 Ciampi agreement? There is actually something: and it is the conditions of absolute emergency in the country. In 1993 the emergency was the economic crisis that had begun a year earlier (and partially resolved by Giuliano Amato with the agreement of July 1992 which, to put it jargon, "put a piece of it"), a crisis which in turn was part of a disastrous political context, with parties decimated by Mani Pulite and businesses in turn beheaded by the arrests of big names in the industry. The signing of the Ciampi protocol saved Italy from the catastrophe, restoring stability to the economy and credibility to the country. Today's agreement on public employment, in its small way, is part of a national framework not too dissimilar from that of almost thirty years ago, albeit for totally different reasons: we are also experiencing a very serious economic crisis today, caused by Covid, and we see a political system once again upset and in dangerous fibrillation.
A substantial difference, compared to 1993, is that, today, to save us (at least from the economic crisis, politics is another matter) will come the Next Generation Eu. Which, however, to be used in the best way, requires the collaboration of all parties – government, politics, social partners – and above all maximum social cohesion. Exactly the same social cohesion that was essential to bring the country out of the quagmire in 1993, and which was achieved thanks to Ciampi's wise foresight. And that today we hope to realize again, thanks to Mario Draghi, step by step.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/economia/accordo-governo-draghi-cgil-cisl-uil/ on Sun, 14 Mar 2021 07:00:20 +0000.