Lettori Win Again But Fear Italian Houdini Tactics

by Domenico Paccitti SOME 1,500 FOREIGN-language lecturers, or lettori, who teach their mother-tongue in over sixty Italian universities recently had their fourth job discrimination case against the Italian government upheld at the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in Luxembourg. On 26th June the ECJ ruled that lettori at sample universities in Milan, Pisa, Rome, Naples, Basilicata and Palermo were being denied the same labor rights as Italian nationals. But despite their victory, the lettori, who were represented by the European Commission, and about one third of whom teach English, remain sceptical of ever obtaining genuine justice. The lettori won their first case back in 1989, when the ECJ found their fixed-term contracts to be discriminatory, and ordered conversion to open-ended ones. The Italian government not only failed to implement the Court's decision correctly, but by sleight of hand actually downgraded the lettori from teaching staff to technicians. The fiercest reaction came from David Petrie, a dogged Scotsman who left his native Dumbarton 15 years ago to teach English at the University of Verona. The trade union, Allsi, which he formed in order to defend lettori's rights and which he now chairs, boasts 500 members. Petrie told Adjunct Advocate: "If the Italian state does not order its universities to conform to EU law, the next step will be for the European Commission to take them back to Court with a view to levying weekly, monthly or daily fines. Italy cannot risk this." Allsi is currently preparing a detailed report on universities that are failing in their obligations. Some universities, like Florence, says Petrie, accepted through their "leftist corporate trade unions" to be downgraded to technical and administrative staff in exchange for a wage deal. In August, Italian premier Silvio Berlusconi agreed to a proposal by the Italian rectors' Conference to complete the lettori's downgrading by inviting them to participate in open public examinations for better paid jobs as technicians, which could leave them vulnerable to easy sacking. But Petrie, whose trade union is committed to having his members' full rights as teaching staff respected, says that he will advise against accepting the offer of a higher short-term wage agreement on the grounds that they will lose out on seniority payments and pensions. Irishman Henry Rodgers, who teaches English at Rome's La Sapienza university-Europe's largest with 170,000 students-bears the distinction of being the only lettore to have addressed a Member State parliament about the discrimination issue. The Irish government then successfully lobbied the European Commission to open the infringement proceedings which resulted in the June ruling. Reviewing the lettori's long-running battle against discrimination, Rodgers said: "Italy has shown an almost Houdini-like ability to evade ECJ rulings. Clearcut verdicts have been deliberately misinterpreted, causing us to return to the Court for further refinements of its judgements. Italian universities, which one might reasonably have expected to exemplify and transmit the European ideal, have instead engaged in a well-documented discrimination which totally flouts EU law and runs counter to the goal of integration."