Read the Final Statement published by the Italian NCP 9 December 2024: English
On 15 July 2021, five trade unions (Communications Workers of America (CWA), IUE-CWA (the industrial division of CWA), American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO), IndustriALL Global Union, and UNI Global Union) submitted a specific instance to the French, Italian, and US NCPs alleging that EssilorLuxottica S.A., a Franco-Italian vertically integrated multinational holding company, had not observed the Concepts and Principles (Chapter I), Human Rights (Chapter IV), and Employment and Industrial Relations (Chapter V) provisions of the Guidelines. Specifically, issues related to misleading and menacing communications to workers, an anti-union website containing multiple threats of negative consequences if workers form a trade union, and captive-audience meetings in the company’s plant in Georgia, USA.
The NCPs coordinated and decided that the Italian NCP would lead on handling the specific instance with significant support from the US NCP and support as necessary from the French NCP.
On 21 October 2022, the NCP completed an initial assessment deciding to accept the case for further examination. The NCP made an offer of good offices, which both parties accepted.
On 9 December 2024, the NCP published a final statement concluding the case without agreement between parties. Notably, it emerged that the position of the parties diverged considerably due, in particular, to the reluctance of the company to accept the Guidelines as a standard of conduct applicable to the issues, notably as it did not conflict with US law. The conciliator made recommendations to the company, notably, to consider that there is no conflict between the freedom of association and the principle of non-interference and to recognise that the Guidelines can be applied alongside domestic law and go beyond it; and to refrain from interfering with unionisation processes in the future.
The NCP does not have plans to conduct a follow up.