Stellantis Italian Workers Plan Strike Over Production Capacity Decline

Stellantis’ Italian metalworkers are planning a one-day strike to protest the automaker moving production capability out of the country.

The strike, planned for Oct. 18, is called by the UILM union as most of the automaker’s plants in Italy witness a steep output decline in the first half of the year, according to data from the FIM-CISL union, with an overall 25% decline, Reuters news agency reports.

That union now expects Stellantis to produce a little more than half a million vehicles versus 751,000 built last year in the country home to several of its most iconic brands.

The Italian government has already protested against Stellantis models claiming to be Italian products, forcing the company to remove Italian flag stickers from the Topolino urban runabout which is made in Morocco.

It also insisted the company change the name of its battery-electric compact SUV from Milano to Junior because the vehicle is constructed at its plant in Poland.

Now the unions are worried that the automaker could be accelerating its business strategy to move more of its vehicle manufacturing to countries where labor costs are much cheaper.

However, the automaker is having to respond to a drop in demand, especially for its BEVs, leading to repeated production stoppages at Italian plants with workers put on furlough, partly funded by taxpayers.

During a press conference with the leaders of FIOM and FIM-CISL, the two other main metalworkers unions in Italy, UILM's Rocco Palombella, says: “The situation is bad, very bad.”