• Tweeter

  • republish

The Ilva steelworks in Taranto (Italy). The ArcelorMittal group has planned to start shutting down the blast furnaces and return the site keys by early December. REUTERS / Tony Gentile / File Photo

The tone goes up between ArcelorMittal and Rome. The multinational is no longer talking about the issue of removing the legal shield to implement the clean-up operations of the Taranto site without the risk of criminal prosecution for past mistakes. But his Indian bosses, Mittal father and son, announce that " the problem is industrial " and propose to solve it by removing 5,000 direct jobs out of 10,700. That is almost half of the workforce.

As Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte said in a tone that is both harsh and alarming , " it's the red alarm " for the giant steel mill in Taranto. The meeting between the owners of ArcelorMittal and the government did not allow to soften the positions of the multinational. Two options were presented: either the delivery of the keys of the site, or the dismissal of 5,000 people, says Anne Le Nir , our correspondent in Rome .

Two million euros of daily losses

ArcelorMittal estimates that its € 2.4 billion investment plan, which allowed it to win the tender for the takeover of the largest steel mill in Europe, can not work. Four million tonnes of steel were produced this year instead of the planned six million tonnes. And losses are estimated at two million euros a day. For the government, the dismissal of 5,000 workers is " unacceptable ". Giuseppe Conte, however, leaves the door of negotiations open for 48 hours, hoping, he said, that ArcelorMittal will think to find a solution.

For his part, the departmental secretary of the union Fismic Confsal, Davide Sciurti is alarmist: " If everything happens quickly, in January already, there will be a disaster. The problem is of an absurd gravity! It's a time bomb that's about to explode. The Ilva de Taranto represents a significant part of Italian GDP. So that would mean that Italy would give up a piece of industry, which, in our view, it can not deprive itself of. So we have to find a solution. "

" There should be a clearer standard "

" It is obvious, " he says, " that companies must take responsibility, and it is normal for them to bear the costs of respecting the environment. But, we can not put on their backs all the events that occurred in previous years. So, there should be a clearer standard that does not scare the company. The real tragedy is that in Italy, we do not have a political model that understands what is happening. "

► ALSO READ: Italy, ArcelorMittal cancels buyout of Ilva steelworks