The CGIL and USB unions have called a new national general strike for today, Friday 3 October, “in defense of the Global Sumud Flotilla, the constitutional values and Gaza”, less than two weeks after the national mobilization that had involved all of Italy on 22 September.
Shortly after the announcement, the Minister of Transport Matteo Salvini evaluated the possibility of preceding the strike, while the Guarantee Commission on strikes declared the “illegitimate” mobilization because it is not communicated with a minimum notice of 10 days, as required by law 146/1990. The unions have already announced their intention to challenge the provision: in the meantime, events and processions have been organized in dozens of Italian cities, from Palermo to Bologna, up to Genoa, Venice and Potenza. According to what reported by the CGIL, about 100,000 people are participating in the processions of Milan. Hundreds of trains were deleted at the stations of Naples, Milan and Rome, while the ports of Trieste and Livorno were blocked by port workers to protest against the block of the flotilla and against what is happening in the Gaza strip.
But, therefore, what is meant by preceding and in what risks can those who decide to strike anyway?
The meaning of preceding and requirements to organize a strike
Previous is an administrative measure with which the competent authority requires the limitation of a strike. Specifically, it is an administrative measure, with the form of an order, “whose adoption presupposes the existence of a founded danger of a serious and imminent prejudice to the rights of the constitutionally protected person”.
In other words, preceding is a tool with which the state can limit or postpone a strike if this risks blocking essential public services, such as transport, health, school or safety. The goal, in this case, is not to avoid protesting protesters, but serves to balance the right of workers’ strike with the rights of citizens who could undergo serious inconvenience due to the strike.
The order of the preceding was introduced by law 146/1990, which requires strikes to respect some very precise rules in order to be considered legitimate: a mandatory notice of at least 10 days before the start of the strike, the communication in writing of the duration and the reasons for collective abstention and the presence of hourly guarantee bands, during which the provision of the services normally offered must be guaranteed.
What can happen to those who do not respect the preparation
The right to the strike, however, is recognized by article 40 of the Italian Constitution, which establishes that “the right of strike is exercised in the context of the laws that regulate it”, among which law 146/1990 is precisely included.
In the event that the criteria we talked about above are not respected, it is possible to prevene (and therefore “command to work”) the workers who should have participated in collective abstention. If not, the prevailing provision should be respected, there are administrative pecuniary penalties (from a minimum of 500 euros up to a maximum of 1000 euros for “day of non -compliance”) against the subjects who have not respected the provision.
In any case, those who promote the strike (like the unions) can decide to challenge the preceding provision before the competent regional administrative court within 7 days from its communication.
In the specific case today, in fact, CGIL and USB have communicated their intention to challenge the provision on the basis of article 2, paragraph 7, of law 146/1990, which establishes that:
The provisions of this article in terms of minimum notice and indication of the duration do not apply in cases of abstention from work in defense of the constitutional order, or protest for serious events harmful to the safety and safety of workers.
According to the two unions, these two conditions would be respected because “not defending the compatriots arrested in free waters, the constitutional rules are not being respected”. At this point, it will be the task of the judiciary to evaluate the actual legitimacy of the strike.
