Agreement signed for air traffic controllers

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In June 2002, an agreement on various pay and flexibility issues was signed by trade unions and Italy's National Air Traffic Control Agency. The agreement should open the way for the renewal of the national collective agreement for air traffic controllers, which expired in December 2001.

The national collective agreement for air traffic controllers expired in December 2001, and negotiations over its renewal have continued since. The failure to conclude a new agreement has led to persistent industrial conflict, with serious disruption to air traffic and a deterioration in the industrial relations climate in this sensitive sector. The bargaining parties are the National Air Traffic Control Agency (Ente nazionale assistenti di volo, Enav Spa) and trade unions representing some 90% of its employees - 2,991 of Enav's 3,368 workers are members of one of the numerous trade union organisations which have obtained representation since the demilitarisation of air traffic control.

On 25 June 2002, an agreement was signed which should open the way for the conclusion of a new sectoral agreement for air traffic control. On the trade union side, the deal was signed by seven organisations, together representing 72% of the sector's workers: the Federation of Italian Transport Workers (Federazione Italiana Lavoratori Trasporti, Filt) affiliated to the General Confederation of Italian Workers (Confederazione Generale Italian del Lavoro, Cgil); the Italian Transport Federation (Federazione Italiana Trasporti, Fit) affiliated to the Italian Confederation of Workers' Unions (Confederazione Italiana Sindacati Lavoratori, Cisl); the Italian Transport Workers' Union (Unione Italiana Lavoratori Trasporti, Uilt) affiliated to the Union of Italian Workers (Unione Italiana del Lavoro, Uil); the General Union of Labour (Unione generale del lavoro, Ugl); the Italian League of Air Traffic Controllers (Lega Italiana Controllori Traffico Aereo, Licta); Assivoloquadri, representing managers; and Sacta. The Italian Confederation of Autonomous Workers' Unions (Confederazione Italiana Sindacati Autonomi Lavoratori, Cisal) and Italian Confederation of Autonomous Workers (Confederazione Italiana Lavoratori Autonomi, Cila) did not sign the agreement and will continue to protest.

The agreement signed on 25 June provides for:

• a performance-related bonus linked to the performance of both individual workers and operational units;

• a commitment to define new job classification levels 'aimed at making the development of new professional profiles and pay levels more coherent'. New specialised training schemes will be organised to implement the new system;

• the introduction of a health insurance fund;

• negotiations over the criteria for workers' geographical mobility;

• a reduction of overtime working; and

• the creation of two new remuneration systems linked to the performance of operational units and to work organisation.

Massimo Varazzini, the director of Enav Spa, stated that the agreement falls within a new strategy that the company is also seeking to pursue in the renewal of the national collective agreement for air traffic controllers. Under this new strategy, 'greater labour force flexibility' is seen as essential. Furthermore, the company will use Europe-wide tendering to reduce its costs, as Italian suppliers are seen as too expensive.

The trade unions which signed the deal believe that it will usher in a period of industrial relations stability which will make it possible to resume negotiations over the renewal of the sectoral collective agreement. Fit-Cisl, the largest union at Enav, made it a condition of signing the June 2002 agreement, that a meeting should be held between the social partners and the government to examine the application of an agreement signed on 12 December 2000, providing guarantees for the workforce during Enav's conversion into a joint-stock company (IT0101267F).