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A billion-euro (1.45 billion dollar) rescue plan for Alitalia on Monday won final clearance for takeoff by the near bankrupt Italian flagship's workforce, media reports said. Two unions representing some four-fifths of Alitalia's flight attendants reluctantly signed on to the plan by the Italian Air Company (CAI) investor group at a meeting with Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's top aide Gianni Letta.
"We signed the agreement but there is nothing to celebrate," union leader Antonio Di Vietri told reporters. His Avia union is one of nine representing Alitalia employees. "It's a painful time," Di Vietri said. "One in three will be laid off and hundreds will have to move to keep their jobs." Under the rescue plan, CAI will take over Alitalia's passenger activities and merge them with Italy's number two airline Air One, which is also faltering.
CAI will rehire some 12,500 workers, while laying off 3,250 - about half of them flight attendants. The government has promised compensation over seven years for those who lose their jobs.
With the unions finally on board, speculation mounted over which potential foreign partner - Air France-KLM or Lufthansa - might help keep the near bankrupt Italian airline aloft. Earlier press reports said Air France-KLM was now ready to take a minority stake of between 10 and 20 percent while Lufthansa wants as much as a 49 percent stake.
Berlusconi rejected reports that the two European rivals were preparing take-over bids for the troubled airline, insisting that he could "rule out" such a scenario for at least five years, citing a clause in the rescue plan. The prime minister had promised during the campaign ahead of elections he won in April to keep Alitalia in Italian hands, vowing to block a take-over by Air France-KLM that was then on the cards.
Alitalia, 49.9 percent state owned, is losing about three million euros (4.3 million dollars) a day and has debt of about 1.2 billion euros, which is now to be shouldered by the Italian taxpayer.
Air France already holds a two percent stake in Alitalia. In the union negotiations, a first breakthrough came last Thursday when Italy's most powerful union, the CGIL, signed on after obtaining last-minute concessions on pay, leave and contractual issues. Then holdout pilots came on board in the early hours of Saturday, leaving the small flight attendants and ground crew unions little choice but to mount a symbolic resistance on Monday.
The daily La Repubblica argued on Saturday that Alitalia "does not have the critical mass in financial terms or the operational capacity to hold out against its global competitors."

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2008

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