The Pd reformists against the referendum on the Jobs Act: "We will not vote on three questions"

On the same topic:

Giorgio Gori, Lorenzo Guerini, Marianna Madia, Pina Picierno, Lia Quartapelle and Filippo Sensi distance themselves from Schlein's line on the CGIL referendums on the Jobs Act: of the four questions proposed, they say in a letter sent to Repubblica , they will vote yes only on the one on contracting companies.

So far, the issue of the Jobs Act has been handled within the party without any particular rifts, despite various internal discontents. In February, during the national management of the Partito Democratico , secretary Elly Schlein made it clear that the party line is to vote in favor of the referendums against the Jobs Act. Today, however, the reformist wing comes out into the open with a clear position: "We will vote yes to the referendum on citizenship and yes to the question on contracting companies. But we will not vote on the other 3 questions, because the condition of work in Italy depends on the future, not on a sterile showdown with the past ." At the electoral appointment of June 8 and 9, the first opposition party will arrive divided.

Read also:

According to the six senders, one of the rules that the referendum intends to repeal (the introduction of the contract “with increasing protections”) “has already been distorted by the Constitutional Court and tweaked by the Conte I government”. Consequently, the success of the referendum would not bring the scenario back to the original text of the Workers' Statute of 1970, “but to the Monti-Fornero reform” . In detail, “the possibility of reinstatement in the case of “manifest non-existence” – very rare – would resurface and, in compensation, the maximum compensation in the case of unlawful dismissal would go from the current 36 months' salary to just 24”.

The reformists defend the 2015 reform: “ The Jobs Act wanted to fight precariousness and overcome the rift between “hyper-guaranteed” workers and “peripheral” workers on whom all the flexibility required by the production system tended to be unloaded”. Elements that make the 2015 reform “the last organic measure on work passed in Italy, to harmonize our discipline with that of other EU countries, inspired by the best experiences of labor law of European social democracies”.

The defense of the Jobs Act also involves numbers: layoffs have not increased in the last decade, growth in permanent contracts, despite low wages caused by "the low productivity of an overly fragmented economic fabric". To restore dignity to workers, it is necessary to "put into practice the active policies envisaged by the Jobs Act, and not implemented" , from investments in training to a new pact that brings together innovation, productivity, wages and greater participation of workers in the life of companies: "What is not needed is instead to wave a simulacrum out of time , with a debate that will distract attention from the real problems, as well as creating divisions in the progressive and trade union fields".

The position was then reiterated by Picierno to Corriere, according to whom the referendum instrument is not the most suitable to resolve the issues inherent to the relationship between production and workers: "As far as these aspects are concerned, yes, I would have avoided it" . Already in an interview with Il Foglio , the vice-president of the European Parliament had denounced "the exclusively ideological purpose" of the referendum against the Jobs Act, making the risk "of returning to an old and disorganized regime, with evident worsenings, such as on Naspi", increasingly concrete. In the Democratic Party " there is no showdown underway - Picierno stressed today - to those who criticize us, from the majority, I would like to remind that the last real season of reforms was implemented precisely by the PD. From the government, so far, only announcements".

More on these topics: