Large-scale retail trade, contract negotiations broken: strike on Easter Saturday

If last week the national collective agreement for the tertiary sector was renewed, signed by Confcommercio and Confesercenti, with Filcams, Fisascat and Uiltucs, yesterday instead there was a breakdown in the negotiations of Modern Organized Distribution (Federdistribuzione), which together with the distribution contract cooperative is the other sector contract that has been missing for several years now. The contract in fact expired in 2019 and is awaited by over 240 thousand employees of the companies associated with Federdistribuzione.

After non-stop negotiations that had been going on for a couple of days, a situation of “resistance in signing contractual agreements has been created for the unions. An attitude that has already inflicted considerable damage on workers in the sector, as demonstrated by the previous renewal of 19 December 2018, which occurred after a 45-month delay compared to the signing of the Confcommercio contract of 30 March 2015, resulting in a deadweight loss for workers, in the order of several thousand euros and in terms of lower wages received in the span of contractual validity compared to their colleagues who, despite carrying out and operating in the same sectoral context, received more significant economic treatments”. Precisely for this reason the unions have decided to call a strike for March 30th, Easter Saturday.

Federdistribuzione’s reasons …

For their part, the Federdistribuzione companies note, “with regret, the unilateral break by the trade unions themselves”. But they explain that the wage issue was addressed «with a sense of responsibility, giving broad openings to the trade union organizations and finding substantial harmony, to respond to the need to protect the purchasing power of workers». Furthermore, «some regulatory adjustments to the contract have been proposed, always respecting acquired rights, to accommodate changes that have occurred in recent years in the organization of companies’ work and with the aim of making its application more punctual». Given the point at which the negotiation had reached, the breakdown of the negotiation thus becomes “a lost opportunity, due to an absolutely unmotivated unilateral act of the trade union organizations”. To this, the companies add that “the statement announcing a strike day on 30 March 2024 is an act of serious irresponsibility, without foundation”. The hope of the companies is to be able to resume the dialogue in a constructive manner and taking into account all the elements that emerged at the negotiating table.

… and those of the unions

Filcams Cgil, Fisascat Cisl and Uiltucs in a note however note that the state of the negotiations had not yet led to a real convergence on many regulatory issues and point the finger at «the introduction of uncontrolled and generalized flexibility with fixed-term contracts indefinite (over 24 months), the dismemberment of the personnel classification system with the attribution of the person responsible for auxiliary sales operations to lower tasks such as cleaning sales and service areas, the elimination of any professional dignity with the under the supervision of those who are responsible for entire complex commercial formats, the creation of a new task dedicated to the movement of goods, dragging it towards the fifth level and emptying the current forecast at the fourth level, for the sole purpose of saving companies on the skin of their workers.”