Against David Goliath: what emotion goes through us, when the little one (supposedly) defeats the almighty. Unfortunately, this is something that happens very occasionally, because it is very difficult to achieve it.

A few months ago we had a feat from Italy. The multinational GKN wanted to close the Florence work centre and dismiss over four hundred workers in July 2021. The struggle, after three years, is still standing. 180 workers are still in the workplace and want to develop cooperative production in line with the eco-social transition.

A last-minute judicial victory keeps alive a struggle that has become a global benchmark. In fact, on 1 January 2024 the workplace had to be permanently closed, but a ruling against the company that left on 27 December 2023 forced it to remain open.

The workers fought anyway against the closure of the company from the start. Since 9 July 2021 they received the email that they were going to the street, they occupied the work center tomorrow, afternoon and night, 365 days a year, and today they are there. Unpaid since November 2022, they stand thanks to a solidarity fund. They have carried out massive demonstrations with various social movements in the region. And in July 2023, two years after the start of the struggle, they took another step: they drew up a restructuring proposal for production in the workplace to join the eco-social transition. In addition to the titanal struggle to maintain the workplace and employment, they built an alternative proposal for the future. Exemplary.

During these years the company has acted, as it could not otherwise be, and with tempting offers to workers, taking advantage of their sorrows and needs, many have managed to accept individual layoffs in exchange for substantial remuneration. However, the company has failed to achieve its objective, as the 180 workers who remain in combat have refused to sign anything. There is no reason to close the company. They want to work there and decide to stand up for this injustice, although they know that it is not the easiest and most economically beneficial way. That's what excites us.

In the Basque Country we have also had a similar case, in Urduliz. On the one hand, a multinational suddenly decided to close a well-functioning workplace, a clear case of relocation. On the other hand, the Committee on Labour proposed an eco-social conversion of production as a solution. But similarity doesn't mean equality. There is a great difference between the battle of Florence and that of Urduliz. Let's see it.

Multinational Stellantis closed the Mecaner Working Centre in Urduliz overnight and fired 148 workers on 1 September 2023.

Here too there were workers who wanted to go on indefinite strike against closure, but the majority unions in the company (LAB, ESK and CCOO) did not want. Some were doing loose strikes, others, stop working. Finally, as of February 7, 2024, 50 ALS workers started an indefinite strike. These workers, like those of GKN, had a solidarity fund for the indefinite strike: the resistance fund.

Of course, the company also played there, and in order for the conflict not to be prolonged in the trials, Stellantis put on the table a tempting economic departure in exchange for closing the company and ending all conflict.

The workers who had been on indefinite strike since February were opposed to this agreement: it was to give in, to accept injustice. Yes, the signing of the agreement was the easiest and most economically advantageous route, but was the struggle not worth it? You could beat the giant. It would be difficult, hard, painful, but, notice, a judgment against the company, as in Florence, would be exciting.

But as I said at the beginning, these things happen very occasionally. Normally the giant wins. And in Urduliz, the majority unions approved the company’s offer of agreement. Accept redundancies and closure in return for good pay and give up any fight against the company.

That is understandable. Workers in an extreme and difficult situation are entitled to put an end to their nightmare and leave the company in the best possible condition.

In order for us to rise up, the emotion that arouses the support and struggle of the workers of the GKN in Florence in us gives us a lesson: the struggle of the workers against the unfair closure of a multinational gives the measure of the authenticity of the proposal for the eco-social conversion of production being carried out.

Unai Oñederra