Alexandre
Rocco Palombella, Uilm General Secretaryrecently met Italian Minister Aldofo Urso as part of a series of discussions crucial to the future of the Italian automotive industry. This meeting comes just a few days before a key meeting scheduled for August 7where members of the government, unions and Stellantis representatives will meet to discuss the future of the Termoli plant.
The Termoli plant, property of Stellantis, is going through a difficult period, with a series of production stoppages caused by falling sales of combustion-powered cars and the ramp-up of the Puretech engine in the Group's new hybrid models. Producing GME, GSE and V6 engines for prestigious models such as the Alfa Romeo Quadrifoglio and Maserati Trofeo, the plant suffered several production stoppages in July, severely disrupting activity before the summer shutdown.
GME engines, used in the Alfa Romeo Giulia and Stelvio as well as the Maserati Ghibli and Levante hybrids, are experiencing a drop in demand. Similarly, GSE (Firefly) engines are no longer used in new models such as the Alfa Romeo Junior, Fiat 600 and Lancia Ypsilon, which prefer the Puretech engine. The V6 engine remains limited to niche models, contributing to uncertainty about the plant's future. The only remaining prospects are for the Alfa Romeo Tonale and the Fiat Panda, which will continue to be produced until 2027, or even 2030. A launch of the Fiat 500 hybrid with a GSE engine is also planned for late 2025 or early 2026.
The project to convert the plant into a battery manufacturing site, announced in March 2022, has been suspended due to insufficient demand for electric vehicles. Palombella and the Uilm union stress the need to speed up industrial policies to facilitate the transition to electric vehicles. According to Palombella, "we need to double sales of electric cars to meet current and future requirements."
At the meeting with Minister Urso, Palombella expressed concerns about the management of the ecological transition and its effects on the automotive industry. He stressed the importance of Fiat's integration into Stellantis and the challenges posed by the transition to electric vehicles. "We need clear policies from the European Union on the 2035 deadline and the intermediate stages that would require electric car sales to double," he insisted.
The union is calling for full transparency on the future of the Termoli Gigafactory, an essential project for the manufacture of electric batteries. "We are asking for an extraordinary commitment so that this project is not abandoned," said Palombella. The union also asked for clarification on the arrival of new automotive producers in Italy, the impact of government incentives on domestic industry and the sale of Comau, a leader in robotics.
The meeting on August 7 is eagerly awaited, as it will be an opportunity to discuss the latest developments.ar it could decide the future of the Termoli plant and many of its workers. "We are hoping for a change of course from Minister Urso and Stellantis, and for an end to the period of unfulfilled announcements," concluded Palombella. "Without urgent, structuring interventions, we risk losing entire production lines and tens of thousands of workers."
Unfortunately for UIM, there are no laws (yet?) that would oblige citizens to buy certain products. We can certainly reduce the thermal offer, but I don't think Termoli will come out a winner. If electric cars don't sell well in Italy, it's for a number of reasons, the first of which was clearly identified by Fiat's boss as cost, the second being a decades-long policy of wage deflation in the name of competitiveness (unluckily, Serbian wages are even lower), and the third being under-investment in infrastructure linked to a fiscal policy and privatizations (with catastrophic consequences) that have emptied the State's coffers and deprived it of resources. And yet, as we all know, Italy is on the front line in Europe when it comes to the effects of climate change, so stopping burning oil seems the only sensible thing to do. The last thing that EV opponents point out is the lack of maturity of the technology, and rightly so. Samsung has just announced the distribution of batteries that can be recharged in 9 minutes to its automaker customers, but they are still too expensive for Fiat models. This is why we need to invest, instead of launching yet another cost-cutting exercise that ruins the brands' reliability and image, as Tavares is doing.
Doubling sales of electric cars is all very well, but how do you convince customers?
There are always two big stumbling blocks: price and practicality.
For me, the affordable Italian car is dead!
I'd never buy a rebadged Peugeot, let alone an electric one, of any brand.
After more than half the cars I've owned since 1966, i.e. 15 out of 27: 8 Fiat, 5 Alfas, 1 Lancia, 1 Autobianchi. My next car will be a Mazda 3, or CX30 petrol, starting next year!
This is the brand which, in my eyes, still represents the Latin mechanical philosophy, lost since Stelantis took over CFA and abandoned all Italian genius, replacing it with a catastrophe, i.e. conformism and the worst of French mechanical nonsense!