Monti’s labour reform has changed little

"There has been very little recourse to the new rules," said Giorgio Santini, head of labour issues for the CISL trade union, Italy's second largest.

One reason may be that firing procedures are more complicated than ever because the changes have increased the discretionary power of the courts.

The reform made it possible for private firms with more than 15 employees to fire individual workers for business reasons, such as a fall in demand, without necessarily having to re-instate them if a judge ruled the dismissal was unjustified.

In smaller firms, where job protection was much weaker, nothing changed under the reform. The public sector, where protection is strongest of all, was also unaffected. Companies were always able to shed staff if they were restructuring or closing a product line but it was much harder to fire people for poor performance or other reasons. Reuters

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