Hearing on
Immigration and integration:
Roles and initiatives on the social partners and civil society organization
Dublin 22 and 23 June 2006
by
Umberto Saleri
CGIL nazionale - Rome
First of all, let me heartily welcome you all and thank, in my name and on behalf of CGIL, the
EESC, the EFILWC and the ILO, together with all other people who contributed to this event and,
last but not least, my peers, the other delegates, for giving me the chance to learn from the
experience made in other European countries.
I hope my contribution will help joining forces to make immigration the playground of the future
development of mankind.
While this conference is taking place, my country is experiencing a change of government. The
recently approved government claims to be opposite to the previous one which was formed by
openly xenophobic and discriminatory political parties (Lega Nord and Alleanza Nazionale). The
new government is willing to go back to promoting immigration within the EC.
A look at the past and the present situation
The history of Italy until 1975 is strongly based on emigration. About 4 million of my fellowcountrymen are currently scattered all over the 5 continents and were allowed to vote during the last
general elections, while 58 million people are of Italian extraction (natives). Their number is higher
than the number of Italians living in Italy.
When this huge exodus began, some far-sighted people immediately tried to give assistance and
protection to Italians living abroad. These people belonged to both clerical and non-clerical
voluntary organisations. Francesca Cabrini, Scalabrini and the Union Trust are already part of
history.
CGIL, which this year celebrates its centenary, has always committed itself to following, helping,
promoting the joint self-defence of those workers, who were forced to left their home country.
The experience of Italian emigration, the sacrifices made and indignities suffered, should serve as a
warning for a genuine welcome and coexistence.
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Unfortunately many of my fellow-countrymen have let these memories fade in their minds and in
their hearts.
Italy is a strongly attractive country to migrants, both for historical and geographical reasons: they
are currently more than 3 million and constantly growing in number. To understand the significance
of this phenomenon, it would be worth remembering that the previous government had issued a
decree to regulate the “flow” of migrants, which fixed the number of migrant workers allowed in
the country at 170,000 whereas employers’ demand was more than 500,000 (!).
The Italian Trade Union responded to this need considering this potential as structural and as a
resource to society.
Statutory norms and conference papers
The Statute of Congress of 1991, art. 1, qualifies CGIL as follows: “The General Confederation
Italian of Labour is a multiethnic labour organisation…” whereas art. 16 outlines the roles, powers
and coordination of male and female migrants as self-governed structures; they express and
represent migrants, have a real contractual power of their own, and the right to table proposals
concerning democracy, economics, social and international politics targets.
The former Secretary-General of CGIL, Bruno Trentin, has been the propelling force of this choice
and keeps contributing to the coaching of new migrant executives.
The XV Congress celebrated in Rimini in March 2006 has considered the integration of migrants as
a crucial challenge for its future. One of the 10 conference papers, the 6th, is entirely dedicated to
the “7 rights of migrants” and this matter impacts all the other papers since immigration is a crossparty phenomenon interesting the various sectors (international, European, social status, bargaining,
etc.).
For those who wish to develop this concept, some copies in different languages of summary of this
Congress papers are available c/o this secretary’s office. Very briefly, in the first part of the 6th
paper, some proposals to the Government are made to: introduce a new residence permit for job
search, close down the centres of temporary stay, create a network to manage the migrants’
placement and integration, the devolution to local authorities of residence permits’ granting and
renewal, the urgent approval of an organic law on the right of asylum, the regularisation of migrants
present on the home territory, the extension of the right to vote and be voted in local-government
elections, the reform on citizenship to boost the “jus soli” principle.
In the second part (paragraphs 8, 9 and 10), the commitment of CGIL is directed to its internal
organisation, its specific task, i.e. bargaining and training.
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Tools for integration
To face its multiple needs, CGIL has structured the Territorial Chambers of Labour (CdLT) – its
organisation which generally corresponds to the district council – as schematically represented in
the enclosed table.
Immigration: standard structuring of CdLT CGIL (summary scheme)
RECEIVERS /
NEEDS
FUNCTION
TOOLS
OPERATORS
RESPONSIBILITY
Migrants as
foreigners
Service
“Counters –
Offices”
Service System
Confederation
Leadership
Migrants as
workers
Protection
Bargaining
Migrants as citizens
Integration
Department for
Immigration
Policies
Representation
Migrants
Committees
Migrants
Steering Committee
CdLT
Bargaining Units
Representation
and
representativeness
Coaching policy
Qualified trainers
Confederation and
Bargaining Leadership
Immigration
policy and
bargaining
Immigration and
antidiscrimination
policies Training
Highly
Skilled
trainers
Confederation
Leadership
Bargaining Units
Migrants as social
and political
subjects
Migrants as
candidate General
trade-union
executives
Italian Executives /
RSU
RSU, Bargaining
Units
RSU, Bargaining
Units and Service
System
Bargaining Leadership
Steering Committee
Leadership
The first column starting from left represents the receivers, the second column represents the
function, the third represents the tools, the fourth the operators, the last column represents the
leadership. E.g., when looking at the first column:
To answer the migrant’s needs as foreigner (residence permit, family reunion, etc.) the Chamber of
Labour has started the service function (2nd column) through the tools of the Foreigners’ Counters
(3rd column) operated by the service system officers (4th column) under the responsibility of the
Confederation Leadership.
Another need is to respond to the migrant’s needs as worker in the workplace. This aspect is
essential and very peculiar to the Trade Union. The service granted by the Counters is the first step
to reach the out-of-place migrant, who however turns to this structure a few times in his life – or so
we hope.
The worker works each day, and each day he needs protection (2nd column) through a specific
bargaining (3rd column) made by the bargaining units, i.e. the Trade Union in the workplace, and
the bargaining services (4th column) under the responsibility of the Bargaining Leadership (5th
column).
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To help migrants as citizens (in their daily needs of school, home, etc.) (1st column, 3rd line), we
must realise the importance of the citizenship integration (2nd column) through the tool of the
“Department for Immigration Policies” (3rd column) in collaboration with the Trade Union, the
bargaining units and the service system (4th column) under the responsibility of the Steering
Committee and the Confederation Leadership.
The “Department for Immigration Policies” was founded during the last Congress to replace the
simple Migrants’ Office, to stress the importance of this service.
If we look at the 4th line: the needs pointed out are those of migrants as political-social subjects (1st
column) in their function of representation (2nd column) through the Migrants’ Committees (3rd
column) organised, inspired and directed by the migrants themselves (4th column), under the
responsibility of the Steering Committee, the Territorial Chambers of Labour and the Bargaining
Leadership (5th column).
Moreover: the migrants as candidate for general trade-union executives (5th line, 1st column), carry
out the primary role of representation and representativeness (2nd column) through a specific
coaching policy on trade-union topics (4th column) under the responsibility of the Confederation
and Bargaining Leadership.
Finally in the sixth line the receivers are the Italian executives and Trade Union (1st column) who,
being familiar with the immigration policy and bargaining (2nd column), through training courses
on immigration and anti-discrimination policies (3rd column) made by highly skilled trainers (4th
column) under the responsibility of the Leadership (5th column), realise a real integration policy.
Negotiating integration
The objective of CGIL is not to produce a separate negotiation, a sort of contractual segregation for
migrant workers. It is about equality of treatment and of citizenship, a real equality, therefore the
Trade Union initiative should remove the obstacles to equality, being a contractual and antidiscriminatory action.
As far as method is concerned: the national labour contract should ratify the need and possibility to
negotiate with firms specific rights in connection with the peculiar conditions of the migrant
workforce employed in the factory or mill, providing a special “window”.
Besides the first part of national contracts dealing with the right to information and the union
relations covers joint committees to analyse work organisation standards to exercise “specific” right
(professional training, retraining, equal opportunities for migrant female workers).
In particular: national, territorial and business contracts all contain the following specific claims:
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
Oral and written information on prevention against accidents and professional illnesses,
using bilingual material with suitable international symbols;

Negotiated management of holidays and leave planning to go back to the home country;

Recognition of the right to the observance of the main religious holidays;

Diversification of meals served in the office canteen;

Negotiation of monthly pay advances to be paid back or use of severance pay shares in
special cases.
A survey by IRES (Economical Institute of Social Research) in connection with CGIL about “The
work of migrants in collective bargaining and territorial negotiation” (this one’s available too, but
only in Italian) concretely shows the achievements of CGIL in this sector.
Training for migrant executives
In order to reach the objective placed by the last Congress – the principle of proportionality of the
representation of migrant workers within managerial and executive organisms – a training policy is
needed.
A pilot-course has been directed to 25 migrants chosen among the various bargaining units. The
course was structured into 6 residential sessions of 3 days with the following contents: historical
and organisational aspects of the CGIL and representation; the negotiation, the labour market,
relational capacity within organisations.
This first course served as a large-scale training laboratory, so that all the staff can retrain between
one congress and the other.
“Mixed” courses featuring Italian and migrant unionists are being arranged; this need was raised by
migrant attendants but is coherent with the CGIL’s policy.
Prospects
As far as the government is concerned: we trust that the Union’s electoral program will become
reality (many of our demands have already been approved) without being confined to mere political
propaganda.
As far as the CGIL is concerned: we are facing a contradiction: while the management is conscious
of the importance of the immigration topic, the body of the organisation strives to follow the
congress instructions, as confirmed by the aforesaid survey. The attention appears as confined, both
for national contracts and for decentralised and second-level negotiation. The placement of migrant
in the work environment, read across the lens of collective contracts, risks not to duly account for
the commitment actually shown by the Trade Union in favour of migrants.
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The CGIL is the most representative organisation with 200,000 migrant members. Some of them are
managers, both as national leaders (in the building category) and CdLT leaders. The integration of
migrants is a big and beautiful challenge, still going on.
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