Download article in original language : IT0408102NIT.DOC
In July 2004, an agreement implementing provisions on part-time work laid down in the 2003 'Biagi' labour market reform law was signed in the Italian province of Bergamo. The deal was signed by the Bergamo employers' organisation and the provincial representatives of the Cgil, Cisl and Uil trade union confederations. The agreement is very unusual, as such matters have until now been dealt with only in national sectoral collective bargaining.
Law 30/2003 on the reform of labour market regulation (IT0307204F) - the 'Biagi law'- lays down a complex mechanism for the application of the flexible forms of employment contract that it introduces or promotes. In most cases, the social partners are to agree on the conditions under which companies may use these forms of employment, which include new forms of part-time work (alongside forms such as on-call work, 'project' work, staff leasing and job-sharing). According to the law, these conditions must be set by collective bargaining either at national/sectoral level or at 'territorial' level (ie at the level of a geographical unit such as a province). Italy's current collective bargaining structure gives sectoral bargaining at national level a prominent role, and so far the Biagi law has been implemented by such industry-wide bargaining (eg IT0407108F, IT0405102N and IT0401102N).
On 22 July 2004, a 'pilot agreement' (accordo pilota) on part-time work was signed for the province of Bergamo (in the Lombardy region of Northern Italy), following a year of negotiations. The accord was signed by the Union of Industrialists of Bergamo (Unione industriali di Bergamo) and the provincial secretaries of the three main trade union confederations - the General Confederation of Italian Workers (Confederazione Generale Italiana del Lavoro, Cgil), the Italian Confederation of Workers’ Unions (Confederazione Italiana Sindacato Lavoratori, Cisl) and the Union of Italian Workers (Unione Italiana del Lavoro, Uil). The Union of Industrialists of Bergamo has about 1,300 member companies, which employ about 83,000 workers (25,000 of whom are women).
The Bergamo agreement represents a major innovation in the Italian industrial relations system, because it is the first time that fundamental aspects of labour market regulation have been negotiated and defined at territorial level. The agreement aims to adapt the law to the reality of the local labour market, and overturns the normal legal hierarchy of bargaining levels. Unitary workplace union structure s (rappresentanze sindacali unitarie, Rsus) (IT0309304T) and management at plant level in the member companies of the Union of Industrialists of Bergamo will be able to modify, on the basis of the Bergamo provincial agreement, the provisions on part-time work laid down by national/sectoral collective agreements for tourism and all industrial sectors.
The pilot agreement has an experimental duration of one year and provides incentives for companies to increase the number of part-time staff (currently about 4% of total employment in the province) through new recruitment or moves from full-time to part-time employment contracts. The main points cover:
- paid leave. Companies will be able to decide when and how workers employed on part-time contracts based on the new agreement can take 50% of their paid leave;
- fixed-term employment contracts. If companies hire part-time workers or recruit to fill the working time vacated by full-time workers switching to part-time work, they will be able to exceed - by up to 50% - the maximum limits on fixed-term employment (as a proportion of the total workforce), laid down in sectoral collective agreements;
- working time flexibility. Companies will be able to change employees’ working time schedule with two days' notice. In return, workers will be entitled, on the basis of an agreement between individual workers and their employer, to compensatory time off equal to the pay premium for overtime work laid down in the relevant sectoral collective agreement. Employers will decide when and how workers will be able to take 50% of this time off. Since sectoral agreements contains no provisions on overtime work by part-timers, the provincial agreement provides that extra hours worked by part-timers will attract a pay premium that it is half that laid down by sectoral agreements for full-timers. The new form of working time flexibility will not be applied to working mothers, workers with health problems, workers employed on part-time contracts in more than one company and workers taking care of disabled people; and
- pay. Special provisions will apply on variable pay elements linked to company results.
After the first trial year, the partners will meet to assess jointly possible renewal of the agreement. In order to examine the impact of the agreement and the possibilities of other actions the signatories have set up a joint observatory at provincial level. The signatory trade unions have all expressed satisfaction with the agreement.