Freelance journalists: fair compensation is essential

While the Culture Committee of the Chamber of Deputies is working to present a unified draft law on fair compensation (the Moffa bill), which also concerns freelance journalists who are increasingly “at the mercy of the waves,” the unified journalists’ union (FNSI) issues the following statement:

“The Moffa and others’ draft law, aimed at promoting equitable pay in journalism, is an important opportunity to recognize the full moral and material dignity of labor, regardless of the kind of relationship between journalist and publisher, especially with respect to the fair recognition of freelance work, which today is increasingly characterized by hardship and injustice. A balanced agreement for fair compensation of freelance journalism appears possible, and with minor shared additions in Parliament, the draft law could even undergo consideration directly in the legislative body. This is the opinion expressed this afternoon by the Fnsi delegation (Secretary Franco Siddi, President Roberto Natale, Director Giancarlo Tartaglia), both during and after the hearing on the ‘Moffa bill’ before the Culture Committee of the Chamber of Deputies, which concluded the series of meetings with social and institutional representatives. The structure of the proposed law – as noted by Fnsi Secretary Siddi in the report submitted to the Committee – goes in the right direction, because it recognizes the applicability of Article 36 of the Constitution even to “freelancers,” in accordance with the principle that every service must correspond to compensation proportional to the quality and quantity of the work performed, in harmony with the provisions of the national contract for journalists. Therefore, it is important that the law, after establishing the principle, also lays down the framework within which the social partners must determine fair compensation for journalistic collaborations, or, failing that, set mandatory qualitative and quantitative criteria.
This is the condition required to finally overcome the notion, held so far by almost all Italian publishers and also Fieg, that the negotiation of freelance pay should be exclusively between individuals and companies. In this respect, Fnsi’s position has been clear for years and therefore the claim – which is untrue – made by Fieg before the Committee that the social partners together had agreed to exclude freelance work from collective bargaining has no basis.
For the Journalists’ Union, it is time to recognize that freelance journalistic work has a particular specificity that requires correct, timely, and urgent legislative measures, both to guarantee the essential conditions of freedom and autonomy even for individual journalists working as freelancers—not by choice but due to the lack of alternatives—and to ensure decent pay for anyone called to work for the media as a journalist, thus overcoming the current widespread conditions of hardship and marginalization. During the last round of contract negotiations, in fact, even Fieg acknowledged the need for a joint review and assessment of the impact and prevalence of freelance work, which cannot exclude the possibility of determining minimum standards of fair compensation. The law should provide that, if publishers shirk this duty, there is an obligation to comply with minimum standards of fair compensation, to prevent the practice of utterly disgraceful pay levels.
Secretary Siddi also clarified in the report that the social partners must have a role recognized by law and called for an obligation to ensure regular payment, whose proportion for freelance work must be paid by companies on schedule.
In this regard, the need was also noted for further legislative action to be taken, for example by restoring the Lo Presti (Fli) bill to increase the contribution rate paid by clients, which in the case of freelancers without an ongoing collaboration contract (co.co.co.) is only 2%, wholly inadequate for ensuring meaningful social security protection.
The delegation nonetheless submitted to the Committee a dossier of analysis and proposals addressing all the problems of precariousness in the journalism labor market, resulting from the work of the Freelance Work Commission of the National Federation of the Press. In the coming days, Fnsi’s Executive Board will further evaluate the range of initiatives to combat precarious work and defend fair compensation, and will finalize a set of specific actions to be undertaken with the Freelance Work Commission right after the summer break.generic vytorinAn exceptionally important trade union event has already been scheduled from October 7 to 9 in Fiesole at the Cisl study center. For three days, Fnsi, together with its entire Freelance Work Commission, will lead an international seminar with all journalists’ unions from across Europe, with the support and promotion of the European Trade Union Confederation (ETUC), which includes Cgil, Cisl, and Uil, and to which the European Federation of Journalists belongs.”.