Millions Take to Streets in Italian General Strike Tue Apr 16,10:45 AM ET By Crispian Balmer
ROME (Reuters) - Millions of Italians staged a general strike on Tuesday to protest against government labor reforms, filling city centers with carnival-like demonstrations that brought much of the country to a standstill.
Air and rail transport ground to a halt, schools, banks and post offices shut down, and production lines at many top firms stood idle in Italy's first full-day work stoppage for 20 years.
Delighted union leaders said Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi would have to back down in the face of people power and drop controversial plans to make it easier for companies to fire staff in certain circumstances.
The center-right government, elected last year on a promise to modernize Italy, said it was ready to resume negotiations.
But it indicated that it was not prepared to renounce its reforms, which became even more emotive last month when one of their authors, government adviser Marco Biagi, was assassinated by left-wing extremists.
Italy's three biggest unions estimated that as many as 13 million people had heeded Tuesday's strike call out of a total workforce of 21 million. They said at least two million had taken part in protest rallies up and down the country.
Independent observers said they thought the number of strikers was closer to six million.
"This is an extraordinary day," Sergio Cofferati, the leader of Italy's largest union, the CGIL, told a demonstration in the Renaissance city of Florence.
"Government and business will realize that we won't stop until we have reached our objectives."
The strike was aimed at a small part of Berlusconi's planned labor reform -- an adjustment to Article 18 of Italy's labor code, which forces companies to reinstate anyone sacked without "just cause."
CHALLENGE TO 'JOBS FOR LIFE'
Italian companies find it almost impossible to lay off staff without entering into complex negotiations with unions, creating a "jobs for life" mentality that the government says is stifling the labor market and hindering industrial development.
Most economists say the proposed changes are mild, and that Italy must go much further to make the job market more flexible. But unions say Article 18 is the cornerstone of workers' rights, and that the planned changes are the thin end of the wedge.
Railway stations were deserted from early morning, with only unsuspecting foreigners turning up in the hope of catching a train. "See you tomorrow," one ticket seller told a disappointed Spanish tourist at Rome's central station.
Air and rail traffic were due to return to normal gradually later in the day as staggered eight-hour stoppages by pilots, drivers and air traffic controllers drew to an end.
Bathed in spring sunshine, flag-waving strikers filled squares around the country, chanting anti-government slogans and blowing shrill whistles.
"Everyone who isn't Berlusconi, jump now!" sang protesters in Florence as they hopped down the street.
Companies started to count the cost of the day's lost work. Italy's second largest union, the CISL, said some 90 percent of its members at the car maker Fiat SpA had joined the strike and 85 percent of members at the cable and tirefirm Pirelli SpA.
Italian bosses have so far backed Berlusconi's call to overhaul labor statutes that were drawn up in the 1970s, and ministers insisted on Tuesday that Italy could not avoid change.
"Once the (strike) rituals are over, we will have to return to the negotiating table because everyone knows there is a problem with the labor market, with the tax system and with pensions," said Reforms Minister Umberto Bossi.
Analysts said they expected a compromise deal. Common ground is already being forged over the idea of creating an unemployment benefit fund to help those who lose their jobs.
Yet beyond the fight over Article 18 lies a deeper confrontation, with the unions accusing the government of seeking to undermine their traditional role as an indispensable partner in forging economic and social change in Italy.
Relations were badly strained when some ministers linked the unions to the shooting of Biagi, a charge they have angrily rejected.