The entry of labour forces from other countries is justified in the face of low domestic demand, but Italy cannot give in to the idea of ethnic replacement, said Agriculture Minister Francesco Lollobrigida (FDI/ECR) during the Congress of CISAL (Confederazione Italiana Sindacati Autonomi Lavoratori).
Fratelli d’Italia (ECR) is back to talking about ethnic substitution but now refers to immigration – as long as legal – as a resource for the labour market. A very different view if compared to the past, before the party arrived to govern Italy in a coalition with Lega (ID) and Forza Italia (EPP).
“We cannot give in to the idea of ethnic replacement”, the minister said.
“Italians are having fewer children, so we replace them with someone else. That is not the way”, he added, stressing that we need to “build welfare that allows people to work and have families, support young couples to find employment.”
Despite these words, which echo Viktor Orbán’s Hungarian government model, Lollobrigida pointed out that immigration can “become an opportunity for a nation to grow”, despite what Fratelli d’Italia had argued in the past when it stood in opposition to leftist governments.
“I consider immigration a natural and physiological fact. I am the grandson of an emigrant, so I am careful not to think that emigration and immigration is a problem”, the minister explained.
The opportunities to which Lollobrigida refers concern the labour sector, where, according to the minister, the entry of a “labour force” from other countries is justified in the face of many unfilled job positions.
“It needs to be made clear that the first enemy of regular immigration, made through organised flows, is called illegal and clandestine immigration, and it is a path that has been taken so far and that we are trying to change,” he clarified.
Democratic Party (S&D) Secretary Elly Schlein called Lollobrigida’s words “disgusting” and “unacceptable”.
“They take us back to the 1930s, these are words that have the flavour of white supremacism – Schlein said – I hope that Giorgia Meloni and the government will distance themselves from these statements”, Schlein commented.
In 2017, during a sit-in organised by Fratelli d’Italia (ECR) against the ius soli law, the not-yet-president of the council Meloni declared: “We are the nation that last year made 100,000 Italians flee abroad and brought 500,000 asylum-seeking immigrants to Italy in three years. I think there is a design of ethnic replacement in Italy.”
What Lollobrigida claimed was confirmed in writing by the Ministry of Economy, led by Lega (ID) minister Giancarlo Giorgetti, in the Def (Document of Economy and Finance) – the government’s main economic planning document – where it states that foreign working-age immigration could improve the debt-to-GDP ratio.
“Given the demographic structure of immigrants entering Italy, the effect is significant on the resident working-age population and therefore on labour supply,” the document reads.
(Federica Pascale | EURACTIV.it)
Source: euractiv.com
