23 March 2006

Luciano D'Ulizia: UNCI for Italia dei Valori

Today I have the pleasure to publish this letter from Luciano D'Ulizia, President of UNCI (Unione Nazionale Cooperative Italiane), having decided to join forces with Italia dei Valori.

“ I’ve always believed in co-operation as a way that man can realise himself and in the application of the principles of solidarity and equality.
This is what has motivated me to dedicate my whole life to the development and growth of the Italian and European co-operative movement. As a co-operator. As President of the Unione Nazionale Cooperative Italiane {UNCI = National Union of Italian Co-operatives} I have always defended, in all locations, co-operation even against the most ferocious and indiscriminate attacks, coming from political parties, Trades Unions and capitalist lobbies. Today, the co-operative movement represents an essential part of the Italian system of production and it has the capacity to create jobs, to respond to the needs and requirements of people: from health to the home, to social services.

In the last five years, co-operative enterprises have created more than 500,000 new jobs out of a total of 1,500,000 new jobs in the country.
In fact, this year, co-operatives have contributed 7% of the national Gross Domestic Product (GDP). If we consider that Italian economic growth is stable at 0.2%, it is evident that the co-operative world has avoided this country’s recession and it has formed an important factor in social cohesion.
All this has been possible thanks to the anti-cyclical function of co-operation.
Co-operation creates work out of work, putting together the economic, social and civil resources of a territory.
The co-operative method places the person at the centre of its action as a company.
Results achieved by co-operative companies, as demonstrated by data from Censis and CNEL are significant and should be recognised.
Instead we find that we are defined as a system that is not healthy, almost as though we were a cancer in metastasis on the Italian economy.

Go and say that to the thousands of volunteers and members of social co-operatives that each day are taking care of those who are less fortunate than ourselves and of those excluded by civil society.
Ask the thousands of families who, thanks to housing co-operatives, at last have their own home.
Ask the young people, the researchers, and the immigrants who have a life of dignity by participating in a co-operative company.
In one of the meetings in my election campaign, the president of one co-operative, a man who has a disability and who uses a wheel chair as he has muscular dystrophy, said: “thanks to the co-operative movement I feel like a real man, a person.

Even in the co-operative movement, however, there are shadowed zones. But we cannot and must not pay for the mistakes of others. And for this reason, I have embarked on a journey of reflection on the co-operative ethics and values inside the organisation that I have the honour to represent.
This gave rise to my direct involvement with Italia dei Valori, from the experience of 30 years as a co-operator, from the desire to restore to the co-operative companies the rights that a hostile government seems to ignore. A battle for the rule of law, so that what is an important part of our country does not go unnoticed.

Italia dei Valori has not asked us to take out mebership, nor to pay fees, it has given us the possibility to represent co-operators and the Co-operative Movement in Parliament.”

Luciano D’Ulizia – UNCI National President

Posted by Antonio Di Pietro in Politics