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(snip)"(Reuters) - Italy risks a "social explosion" over the government's austerity measures and unions plan more protests against them, the head of the country's largest labor federation CGIL said on Wednesday.
CGIL leader Susanna Camusso told Reuters that Prime Minister Mario Monti's government was "deeply conditioned" by its need for support from the party of his predecessor, Silvio Berlusconi, and its austerity plan spared the rich and demanded excessive sacrifices from ordinary Italians.
"We see every risk of a social explosion," Camusso said in an interview, warning that anger was rising over a pension reform she said was unnecessary, measures that cut already weak purchasing power and a worsening labor market.
The left-wing CGIL and the two smaller and more centrist unions, CISL and UIL, are holding a series of strikes this week to protest against the 33 billion euro plan that aims to shore up public finances and combat Italy's debt crisis.
Camusso, the first woman leader in the CGIL's 105-year history, acknowledged that Monti had made some concessions to union demands by reducing cuts to low pensions and slightly easing a housing tax, but this did not go far enough.
"It would be absolutely excessive to say we are satisfied; the solutions are insufficient," she said, announcing that the CGIL and its partner unions would hold a national street demonstration just before Christmas.
More than half of the CGIL's 6 million members are pensioners.
Speaking in her office in central Rome, 56-year-old Camusso tried to strike a balance between accepting the need for tough measures to solve the debt crisis and an insistence that the steps adopted were unfair.
"We are flexible in the face of the emergency but we are not willing to accept everything," she said. "You can't ride roughshod over people.""(snip)
Of course this article didn't specifically mention what the specific impact of these austerity measures would be ...
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(snip)"Prime Minister Mario Monti has unveiled a €30 billion (NZ$51.6b) package of austerity measures, raising taxes and increasing the pension age in a drive to shore up Italy's strained finances and stave off a crisis that threatens to overwhelm the euro zone.
Packed into a single emergency decree which comes into effect before formal parliamentary approval, the measures followed growing pressure for sweeping measures to restore confidence in the euro zone's third-largest economy.
Monti said the package, divided between €20b of budget measures over 2012-14 and a further €10b in measures to boost growth, was painful but necessary.
"We have had to share the sacrifices, but we have made great efforts to share them fairly," he told a news conference, in which he said he had renounced his own salary as prime minister and economy minister.
In a mark of the emotional impact of the cuts, Welfare Minister Elsa Fornero broke down in tears as she announced an end to inflation indexing on all but the lowest pension bands, a move that will mean an effective income cut for many pensioners.(snip)
(snip)"With yields on Italian 10 year bonds near 7 per cent and almost €160b euros of bonds needing to be refinanced by the end of April, the worry is that market confidence has been so badly damaged that outside help will be needed.
Ad Feedback Deputy Economy Minister Vittorio Grilli said around €12-13b of the €30b package would come from spending cuts with the rest coming from tax increases.
As well as an end to inflation indexing for many pensioners, the measures will see the minimum pension age for both men and women raised in stages to 66 by 2018 with incentives to keep workers in employment until 70.
A new property tax, which head of Italy's local government association Graziano Delrio said would raise some €10-11b, will account for the bulk of the new revenues.
A two-percentage-point increase in value added tax could also be introduced from September next year, while there would also be new taxes on luxury goods like yachts and some gas-guzzling cars.
As part of a crackdown on tax evasion, cash transactions of more than €1000 will be banned, and there were also measures to liberalise business opening hours and open up pharmacies and the transport sector to more competition.
The package also cut a number of local government functions in a bid to reduce the cost of administration.
Monti left for a later date the vexed question of reforming of contracts that hinder companies from laying off workers, a measure seen as key to overhauling the labour market, but which is bitterly opposed by unions."(snip)



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