Snippets from the Italian Scene
Fining Employers for Going Out of
Business: Only in Italy!
Moving in yet another direction, there was recently a front-page snippet about a judge in Torino condemning an employer to compensate his ex employees for "pain and suffering" after his towing company went out of business. An artfully written hook designed to get one to buy the paper and flip through it to read about the stupidity of the judiciary, which goes so far as to fine an unlucky sod whose business collapses!
However, the judiciary don't come across at all stupid when the facts are presented: Turns out that the towing company, which was doing very well, was bought by a couple of brothers who used it as a cash cow, skimming funds from the till to finance other activities, and when the red ink got deep enough simply declared the company insolvent and put the workers out on the street. The demand for ex-towing company workers isn't high no matter how good they are, and as a result some of them got divorced, others turned to crime, and at least one attempted suicide.
When the people who took over the bankrupt business brought it back to profitability in a matter of months the judges became suspicious, demanded to see the books, and promptly had the brothers arrested for fraud. At which point the ex employees filed a class action lawsuit, and won. Compensating workers for the pain and suffering caused by employer fraud isn't such a crazy idea after all.
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