Renzi meets workers from loss-making steel plant

Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi on Sunday met workers from German industrial group ThyssenKrupp's Italian stainless steel plant, where 550 jobs are due to be cut. A day earlier an estimated one million people attended a rally in Rome to protest against Renzi's labour reform plans, which aim to make hiring and firing easier.
Around 70 workers from the loss-making Acciai Speciali Terni (AST) plant in central Italy demonstrated outside a meeting in Florence where Renzi met with five workers.
ThyssenKrupp, which is trying to sell AST and get out of the stainless steel business, said in early October it had started procedures to cut the jobs after talks between labour unions and the company broke down.
A representative for the workers, who have been on strike to persuade ThyssenKrupp to change its industrial plan, said Renzi undertook personally on Sunday to help reach a solution quickly.