Oppositions and unions attack the majority for an amendment which - included in the school decree and approved by the Senate - reduces union representation in the sector. For those who work in the world of education, now only the number of members could count, and not how many vote to choose the unitary union representation. Today in the public sector, representativeness is measured on the average of members and votes obtained in RSU elections and a union can participate in national collective bargaining if it represents at least 5%. The 'turning point' will take place if the school decree is converted into law by the end of November: next week it is expected in the Senate, then in the Chamber. In both cases, trust cannot be ruled out. Therefore the CGIL, Pd, M5s and Avs ask for the law to be withdrawn.
The fuse was triggered by an amendment shared by Fratelli d'Italia, Lega and Forza Italia and voted on Wednesday evening by the Culture commission which is examining the school decree. Pd and M5s are against (Avs is not represented in the Commission) while Italia viva did not participate in the vote to delve deeper into the issue. The proposal restricts the scope of representation in the school "to association data only", we read in the text.
Defending the rationale is one of the signatories, the Italian senator Mario Occhiuto: "This enhances trade union representation based on the effective membership of workers", clarifying that "the RSU will continue to democratically represent those workers, but their electoral result will no longer affect the distribution of permits and secondments, which will be linked exclusively to the number of members".
For the Democratic Party, it is "a coup" which - as senators Susanna Camusso and Cecilia D'Elia say - represents "a very serious attack on the confederal unions": by hitting those who work in schools, it becomes "a blow to democracy". The 'container' chosen for the novelty also irritates: that school decree which - among the most contested measures - sets the maximum number of foreign students in class at 30% and prohibits the full veil at school, and which "does not deal with union representation", observes Peppe De Cristofaro of Avs.
In short, for those against, the matter is extraneous to the decree, too delicate to be changed with an amendment and discriminatory because it only applies to the school sector. The CGIL is also on the barricades, convinced that it is an 'ad personam' attack: "It is a rule with a single objective: to reduce the weight of the FlcCgil, the organization most voted for by school workers", denounces the federation of knowledge workers of the CGIL. And he continues: "This is what hundreds of thousands of teachers and Ata, who went to the polls in schools, are told that their vote is worth nothing."
