Mr Giancarlo Cimoli, chief executive of Alitalia, yesterday predicted that the loss-making Italian carrier would return to profit in 2006 if trade unions agreed to a rescue plan that he called the airline's last chance for survival.
"Today, more than ever, we face an unavoidable course of action, the only practicable way to overcome the company's financial crisis," Mr Cimoli told a shareholders' meeting in Rome.
Alitalia, which is 62 per cent owned by the Italian state, has set a deadline of September 15th for the unions to accept a management plan that would cut 5,000 jobs - more than a quarter of the workforce - and split the airline into a flight operations business and a service business.
Mr Guglielmo Epifani, leader of CGIL, Italy's largest union, cast doubt on whether the nine unions representing Alitalia staff would swallow the job cuts, virtually unprecedented for a company tied so closely to the Italian state. "At this point, it looks difficult to reach an agreement," Mr Epifani said.
Union leaders want Italy's centre-right government to intervene in the crisis to protect jobs, but they received a rebuff yesterday from Mr Pietro Lunardi, transport minister. "The government doesn't have to convene a meeting. I'm expecting the company to come to an agreement with the unions," he said.
Mr Cimoli said Alitalia would make an operating loss this year of €398 million, up from €379 million last year. But if the rescue plan went ahead, the company would cut its loss to €135 million in 2005 and would make an operating profit of €179 million in 2006, he said.
He lashed out at what he called the failure of Italian governments to defend Alitalia and the Italian air transport sector in general, saying Italy had become "the Cinderella of the European sector".
The European Commission has approved a €400 million loan for Alitalia, but the airline cannot draw on the funds until the rescue plan is in place. Even this loan would run out in the early months of next year, by which time an injection of fresh capital would be necessary, Mr Cimoli said.
