Mantovano gives his backing to Ilva

Temporary halt to redundancies by Ilva’s subcontractors. Not thanks to Elly Schlein, who had been shouting about it from stages across Puglia, but to Under-Secretary Alfredo Mantovano, who today convened at Palazzo Chigi the round-table meeting promised by Meloni following the boos in Taranto. “There was a climate of responsibility on the part of all the institutions, so we could not shirk this call to a sense of responsibility,” commented the employers’ associations that had sent out the redundancy notices, announcing the suspension at least until the hearing at the Court of Milan. A social time bomb has been postponed. The initiative had been, above all, a staged move to put pressure on the government, much like that of the trade unions, which – faced with the most serious labour dispute of the century – did not go on strike: they staged a ‘flash mob’.

Everyone knows that no one will be taken off the redundancy scheme until they retire. “Ilva’s future will, in any case, be linked to green initiatives and decarbonisation through DRI-fuelled electric furnaces,” said Mantovano. These are the very same things that Urso has been repeating to no avail for four years, without turning them into reality. Now, however, the state aid funds – which cannot be renewed – have run out. Mantovano has set 15 October as the deadline for final bids, following two years of delays and setbacks presented as steps forward. By then, the new Ilva’s industrial, employment and financial plans should be known. Urso’s mistake—driven by Emiliano—was wanting to replace the blast furnaces with electric furnaces and DRI, demanding a plan that is unachievable by anyone in the world. And, of course, Italian steelmakers cannot achieve it either; they do not want the hot end and have submitted a bid of an entirely different nature. Perhaps we should look to Europe: in 2026, ArcelorMittal restarted blast furnaces in Poland and France and plants in Spain, whilst Italy is shutting down Taranto. Unless, of course, we want to turn the steelworks into a table and steel into wood.