The aggravation of the economic crisis and inflation back in some European countries has resulted in a wave of trade union agitation. In France, Great Britain and Greece, and to a lesser extent in Germany as well, powerful strike movements have been underway for several months. The same cannot be said for Italy where, despite an evident decline in proletarian living standards, the regime trade unions (CGIL, CISL, UIL, UGL) are not calling on workers to strike in order to try and halt the reduction in real wages consequent on the higher cost of living, which, even before the rise in inflation (see “Il declino costante dei salari in Italia” in Il Partito Comunista, no.421) has been underway for the last thirty years.

In order to conceal their cowardly and traitorous conduct the CGIL, CISL and UIL called for three inter - regional demonstrations on 3 Saturdays in May [2023] - in Bologna (May 6), Milan (May 13) and Naples (May 20) - “to obtain changes to industrial, social and economic policy”.

In so doing, the regime unions are renouncing, in fact trying to prevent, a struggle from developing; a struggle, that is, which is conducted by means of strikes, and which calls for wage increases in both private and state enterprises. In such a way the defense of the purchasing power of wages is postponed until a hypothetical fiscal reform to reduce how heavily wages are taxed is passed. Such a demagogic maneuver, plotted by government and corporativist trade unions in concert, mustn’t deceive us. There are indeed various factors which discourage any proletarian acquiescence with this practice of trade union collaborationism.

It is necessary to consider that, even if the taxation on wages was reduced, it must be accounted for the fact that, whereas a strike could impose a pay raise on the employers in a matter of weeks, the dilatory strategy of trade union opportunism would delay, for as long as possible, how long it took for any parliamentary reform to get passed, stretching it out, even in the best case scenario, for years at the very least. And meanwhile, workers’ wages would continue to be cut. If it was decided to try and speed things up, mobilizations would need to be organized that were powerful enough to impose those reforms on the bourgeois government. All of which is highly unlikely, given that such an outcome would require strikes that were even more widespread and powerful than those currently underway in France.

We know that the CGIL - for the CISL and UIL this goes without saying - is totally opposed to which mobilizations on such a scale. And there is an illustrious historical precedent: when faced with the Fornero pension reforms - much tougher on workers than the one just passed in France - all the CGIL did about it was promote a miserable 3 hours of general strike in the private sector and eight hours for civil servants.

Another aspect of the issue is that increasing net wages by cutting taxes on gross wages is a way of avoiding clashes with the bosses and of maintaining social peace, thus postponing any reignition of the class struggle. The industrialists are highly in favor of such a scheme, which would see them temporarily relieved of any pressure on them arising from the discontent of their own work force.

The hypothesis that increasing wages in such a way also avoids the so - called spiral of inflation was a concern underlined on April 11 by the Ministry of Economics and Finances (MEF) in its comment on the ‘Documento di Programmazione Finanziaria del Governo’: “[a] cut in the social contributions paid by employees on middle to low earnings […] will sustain the spending power of families and contribute to the moderation of wage increases […] This decision bears witness to the attention the government is paying to the protection of the spending power of workers and, meanwhile, to wage moderation in order to prevent a dangerous spiral of inflation”.

Therefore the CGIL, the government and the industrialists are all agreed on the way “to increase wages”: by reducing taxes without touching profits. The vice - minister of Economics confirmed this in the Corriere della Sera on April 13, regarding the cutting of three billion from the fiscal wedge for gross annual salaries under €35,000: “an intervention which […] is moving in the direction requested by both the unions and Confindustria”.

From certain preliminary remarks it appears evident how modest the wage increases to be obtained in this way are likely to be, and, taken together with the reduction of real wages which has been happening over many years, they will only make a very small impact. The two latest measures adopted by the government to cut the personal income tax on salaries, taken together, barely amount to an average monthly increase of 50 €.

The demand to reduce fiscal pressure on salaries poses other disadvantages. By reducing the tax on salaries, the fiscal yield is reduced in favor of the bourgeois state, and the ruling classes will seek to offset the loss by reducing the social spending which favors the working class. This does not however mean that the opposite is the case, that by increasing the tax yield social spending will automatically increase as well, and that therefore workers should get behind demands of this sort, such as the famous “tassa patrimoniale” (“La Patrimioniale”, or wealth tax).

In a historic phase of crises of overproduction in the capitalist economy, such as the one which began in the capitalistically - mature countries in the mid - 1970s, in the absence of a trade union struggle to defend the availability of free social services (school, health, transport, care services) based around the demand for more job roles and higher wages in these sectors, any increased tax yield would favor the bourgeoisie, and be spent on propping up businesses, the banking system, and the State’s repressive and military apparatus.

Vice versa, even in the presence of a reduced tax yield, a trade union struggle of sufficient strength, that is, a general struggle of the waged class as a whole, could still impose improvements in the social services that favored the workers, and was to the detriment of the other social classes, and of the military and repressive power of the state.

At the final session of the CGIL’s 19th Congress on March 16, 2023 in Rimini, the Piecard Extraordinaire (“bonzo generale”) Landini) declared that “[t]axation is the mother of all battles”. The ex - secretary general of the metalworkers’ union Italian Federation of Metalworkers (FIOM) - exponent of a group within it which wants the union to be a Leninist class union - said he agreed! This is a case instead of yet another diversion with which to disguise how averse this regime union is to fighting genuine battles, for objectives that actually serve the interests of the workers. Such struggles should be fought for significant wage increases, for the reduction of the working day, for a full wage for the unemployed. To use Lenin’s expression, Landini is an agent of the bourgeoisie inside the proletariat and anyone who doesn’t recognize that is an opportunist.

What is more, by signaling as a goal of the trade union movement “a changing of industrial, economic, social and occupational policies” - instead of strictly trade union objectives - the CGIL is offering sustenance to the bourgeois parties currently in opposition, with the prospect of a possible sudden change of political alliances, or of future political elections, in which the proletariat will be guaranteed the not - much - appreciated right of choosing which gang of bourgeois politicos they want to oppress them.

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Along with tax reform, there is another theme that is being discussed by the bourgeois opposition parties and which has sparked a debate in the trade union organizations, including the combative ones: the minimum wage.

Also applicable here is what we said above: the workers who would benefit from the law would have to wait for the policy to be approved by parliament, far too long a time to resolve a problem which affects workers in the lowest wage brackets right now, and which is thus extremely urgent.

For the bourgeois parties debating the question, it’s a handy demagogic propaganda tool, and is useful in elections. The vagueness of the proposals confirms this, with a figure hovering around about 9 € an hour, but without it being made clear if that is net of national insurance and social security contributions or not. Of one thing we can be sure, however: that when they get back into government, the political parties that are now supporting the passing of such a law will suddenly rediscover their sense of responsibility towards the national economy and towards the capitalists they are putting at risk thanks to the higher salaries, and they will settle on a compromise that is lower.

Here, as well as in the case of a small increase in wages due to a cut in taxes, or to an increase in the “basic citizen’s income”, it is not so much about being for or against these proposals, but rather of explaining what we should do about measures whose aim, at the least possible cost, is to prevent an explosion of social discontent.

So, rather than useful solutions that truly defend working - class living standards, what we are actually dealing with here are schemes advocated for by that part of the bourgeoisie which takes a longer view of bourgeois interests, and which are useful in terms of guaranteeing social peace, moderating wage settlements, and defending profits. And all the more so with regard to the minimum wage and the “basic citizen’s income” since we are dealing with measures proposed by the institutions of the European Union. And joining in the chorus we find Tridico, the president of the INPS (The National Institute for Social Security which deals with state pensions), in the meantime recommending “not touching the Fornero [pension] reform [of 2012]” (La Stampa, April 18, 2023).

But there are additional considerations that pertain to this question. The CGIL, formerly against it, then possibilist, is now linking the proposal for a legal minimum wage to the question of the so - called “pirate contracts” and attaching it to a law on representation.

The pirate contracts are those national collective labor agreements (CCNL) signed by unions with fewer members, in any case not signed by the CGIL, CISL and UIL, and which, according to the CGIL, will negatively impact wage earners by undermining their conditions of employment.

But it is a document from last February from the CGIL itself - by the Giuseppe Di Vittorio Foundation - relating to the year 2022, which shows how out of 14.5 million workers on a wage in the private sector, excluding domestic and agricultural workers, 96.6% were covered by collective agreements signed by the CGIL, CISL and UIL, and only 3.4% (474,755 workers) by collective agreements signed by other unions. According to the same document, in December 2022, according to the Consiglio Nazionale dell’ Economia e del Lavoro (CNEL - National Council of Economics and Labor), 959 national collective agreements were signed in the private sector. Of these, 211 underwritten by the CGIL, CISL and UIL, and 748 by other trade union organizations. According to Affari e Finanza of March 27, 2023, reporting figures that differ little from those in the Vittorio Foundation document, of the 750 or so agreements not signed by the CGIL, CISL and UIL, around half were signed by the UGL, CISAL and CONFSAL (the latter of which are Italian trade union confederations) “often identical or very similar to those of the confederal unions”.

Therefore, the so - called question of the “pirate contracts” only concerns 3.4% of the workers and seems to be a pretext for the CGIL to call for a law on representation which would ultimately guarantee to it, the CISL and the UIL, a monopoly on the negotiation of contracts; with which to defend itself against not the UGL and the other pliable unions created by employers’ organizations to obtain even worse contracts for the workers, but against the class trade unions.

What is more, it turns out that the FISASCAT CISL (Federazione Italiana Sindacati Addetti Servizi Commerciali, Affini e del Turismo - Federation of Commercial Service and Tourism Personnel, plus related occupations, part of the CISL union federation), for example, do not support a law on representation. Also, over the last ten years, the representation measure anticipated in the Testo Unico [One Text] of January 2014, as certified by the INPS, and which involves averaging out the votes cast by the trade union representatives elected directly by employees (or RSUs), and by trade union members, has never once been put into practice. Therefore, not even the different components of the CGIL, CISL and UIL agree on the law on representation, maybe because, up to a point and depending on the category, one union might be favored to the detriment of the others.

The matter of the “pirate contracts” also begins to look increasingly like a way of justifying the miserable results of the greatly extolled CGIL, CISL and UIL contract negotiations.

In fact, there are around 4 million workers covered by the national collective labor agreements signed by the CGIL, CISL and UIL which fix minimum wages below the 9 € per hour gross rate:
    Tourism: minimum hourly rate of 7.48 €
    Cooperative social care services: 7.18 €
    State - owned shops, catering and tourism: 7.28 €
    Textiles and clothing: 7.09 €
    Social care services: 6.69 €
    Contract cleaning, integrated and multi - services: 6.52 €
    Security and caretaking services (vigilanza e servizi fiduciari): 4.60 € per hour for those in the “trust services” (servizi fiduciari) department, and not much more for private security guards at 6 €.

On April 6, a firm was found guilty by the Milan labor tribunal following an action brought by the ADL Cobas to compensate a female worker, because the applicable CCNL labor contract did not guarantee “remuneration proportional to the quantity and quality of work and sufficient to ensure to the worker and their family a free and dignified existence” (Article 36 of the Italian Constitution). The contract referred to was the security and caretaking services agreement signed by the CGIL, CISL and UIL. So, the CGIL, which defends the bourgeois constitution as an absolute and inviolable political principle, is signing contracts which the bourgeois judiciary declares to be in direct violation of it!

To this can be added another factor. The average time it takes to renew the national collective labor agreements in the private sector is 33.9 months, or almost three years.

All this serves to show how the elephantine apparatus of these regime unions, with its thousands of officials, is entirely useless when it comes to defending workers, and serves instead to control and immobilize the working class.

On the question of wages, and in particular on the question of the minimum wage, the Unione Sindacale di Base (USB) organized a convention on March 31 last year in Rome, with Conte, the head of the Five Stars Movement, and Tridico, the president of INPS, invited as guests.

On the one hand, the USB leaders are right in stating that wages can only be defended by means of struggle, and they are promoting a general strike for the 26th of May with the main demand being an average wage increase of 300 €. On the other hand, they are offering support to and seeking sustenance from a bourgeois political party which is agitating the demand for a minimum wage.

But this demand as well would have to be fought for by a strong workers’ movement in order to prevent it being settled within bourgeois and parliamentary parameters, with a paltry law which would end up proving far more useful as a means of maintaining social peace than it would defending wages. Besides, if it was within our power to finally cobble together a fighting trade union movement which was really strong, why would we need to demand a minimum wage rather than a major pay hike for everybody instead?

If, as is the case, the struggle aspect is the main problem, we need to focus on the fact that in France, and in England, the categories which have been out on strike over the last months are ones which in Italy are subject to anti - strike legislation (Law 146 of 1990, and 83 of 2000). These laws that had been anticipated by the codes of self - regulation subscribed to by the “tricolor” (or national/patriotic) unions with a view to preventing the proletarian economic struggle from slipping out of their control. Thus, a substantial part of the wage - earning class in Italy is effectively forbidden from striking by two fascist laws, referred to by the regime unions and approved, under full democracy, by both a Christian Democrat government and D’Alema’s center - left one.

A party which really wanted to show it was on the side of the working class would have to set as a central objective not a minimum wage, but the repeal of such laws, along with the full reinstatement of the freedom to strike. And that is something which, not by chance, no party present today in parliament would ever contemplate doing, even at some distant point in the future. Their thoroughly bourgeois nature is thereby clear. For many decades now, it has been impossible for any party present in parliament to express the interests of anything other than the capitalist class.

The leaders of the USB, therefore, instead of persisting in their opportunist conduct by trying to forge alliances with such parties, should be promoting instead unity of action with all of the forces of combative trade unionism, that is, with the rank - and - file (“base”) unions and the “combative areas” inside the CGIL, and move beyond their correct wage demands at the strike on May 26, by bringing to the fore the issue of defending the freedom to strike. But the head honchos of the USB are instead promoting this strike without involving the other base unions, returning to the practice of “every union for itself” strikes, which was the pattern that existed before the efforts to engage in unitary strikes over the last two years. A nice step backwards then, and those responsible for it are, of course, the opportunist leaders of the major base unions.

The fight against politico - trade union opportunism is a crucial aspect of the class struggle and confirms the necessity and the role of revolutionary communism, of its Party and its activity within the heart of the trade union movement, in order to finally make available to workers the theoretical and organizational weapons it can use to defend itself from capitalist exploitation and, on that basis, pass on to the offensive on the political level.