As Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni commemorated her 1,024th day leading Italy’s government, former premier Giuseppe Conte delivered a scathing indictment of her administration’s economic record, accusing it of abandoning workers amid a spiralling industrial crisis.
Conte’s criticism came hours after Meloni’s celebratory post, spotlighting what he termed a grotesque disconnect between Palazzo Chigi’s political theatre and the realities of Italian households.
“Meloni celebrates, but Italians don’t,” Conte declared on X, citing explosive new data revealing over 314 million hours of state-authorised layoffs in the first half of 2025 alone.
This staggering figure, equivalent to 304,000 workers, predominantly in industrial sectors, has stripped employees of approximately €3,000 in net wages per person during a period of relentless inflation, according to the former Prime Minister.
His statement refers to Il Sole 24 Ore report detailing how industrial layoffs have surged by 35% year-on-year in mechanical and metalworking sectors, eviscerating household purchasing power.
The data corroborates broader trends from Italy’s National Social Security Institute (INPS), which recorded a 30.2% spike in redundancy payments during Q1 2025 compared to the same period last year, the equivalent of 176.5 million authorised layoff hours.
“In 1,024 days, the government hasn’t implemented a single serious wage measure, has rejected the minimum wage, and has even rejected our proposal to supplement the salaries of those on redundancy pay, thus protecting their purchasing power,” Conte wrote.
His accusation underscores how traditional manufacturing powerhouses – engineering, textiles, clothing, and leather – now languish in what INPS describes as “processes of transition and organisational adjustment,” a bureaucratic euphemism for systemic collapse.
Behind Conte’s statistics lies a landscape of escalating distress. INPS’s March 2025 figures reveal extraordinary layoff schemes (Cigs) exploded by 119.47% year-on-year, while ordinary wage supplements rose steadily as employers struggled with slumping demand. Concurrently, applications for Italy’s Naspi unemployment benefit climbed to 1,303,982 claimants – a 2.2% annual increase – signalling deteriorating job security nationwide.
Conte’s proposed salary supplements for those on layoffs, rejected by Meloni’s coalition, were framed as essential armour against destitution. With industrial wages effectively stagnating and 90% of layoffs concentrated in factories and workshops, Italy’s once-mighty manufacturing engine now operates as an accelerator of inequality.
Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party, borne to power in 2022, pledged economic revitalisation. Yet 33 months later, Conte’s indictment, amplified by statistics, suggests a government increasingly estranged from the “forgotten Italians” it once vowed to champion.
