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BBC MUNDO RADIO
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ITALY-RUSSIA-DIPLOMACY |
MILAN — Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi on Friday played down a plan by Fiat to produce a new car in Serbia, saying that he hoped the move would not hurt Italian workers.
"In a free economy and a free state, an industrial group is free to locate where its production is the most convenient," Berlusconi said at a joint news conference in Milan with visiting Russian President Dmitry Medvedev.
"I hope however that this does not happen to the detriment of Italy and Italian workers," he added.
Three members of Berlusconi's centre-right government earlier slammed Fiat's plan to produce a new multi-purpose car, dubbed the L-Zero, in Serbia.
"Frankly, the reasons given are disconcerting and counterproductive," Adolfo Urso, vice-minister for foreign trade, told the daily La Stampa in an interview.
Fiat boss Sergio Marchionne argued that the group wanted to avoid "unnecessary risks" after months of fruitless negotiations with Italian unions.
"We have to be able to make cars without seeing activity stop," he told La Repubblica.
Italian Labour Minister Maurizio Sacconi on Friday called a meeting next week between the government, Fiat management and the unions "to examine the Fiat plan and its repercussions on Italian production sites".
European Affairs Minister Andrea Ronchi also condemned the plan, saying: "At a time of great crisis like the one we are facing, from which Italy is recovering by making tough sacrifices, it hurts to hear about outsourcing plans."
The minister for legislative simplification, Roberto Calderoli, recalling that Fiat sales had received a boost from a government "cash-for-clunkers" programme, said: "You cannot sit down at the table, feed on government incentives and then leave without paying the bill."
Fiat's billion-euro plan for the venture in Serbia would include its own investment of 350 million euros (450 million dollars), plus 250 million euros from the Serbian government and 400 million euros from the European Investment Bank, La Repubblica reported.
Berlusconi's remarks came as Fiat workers observed a two-hour strike Friday to protest layoffs and demand bonuses.
In April, Marchionne said Fiat, Italy's leading private employer with a domestic workforce of some 80,000, would double car production in the country by 2014.
Fiat initially planned to produce the L-Zero at its flagship Mirafiori plant in northern Italy but got bogged down with unions over returning production of the Fiat Panda model from Poland to the Naples-area plant of Pomigliano, Marchionne said.
