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Empresas y finanzas

Italy union ready for general strike against spending cuts


    ROME (Reuters) - Italy's second biggest labour union Cisl said on Monday that it was ready to hold a nationwide general strike if a planned government spending review produces indiscriminate cuts to the public administration.

    "If there are well-motivated cuts we will support them," Raffaele Bonanni, the Cisl leader, said in an interview with Mediaset's 24-hour TV news channel.

    If not, "We will do whatever is necessary, and if a general strike is needed we will do it, but there are a thousand ways to protest," he added.

    Prime Minister Mario Monti's government is expected to present a package of state spending cuts this week that it wants to pass in place of a 2-percentage-point increase in sales tax which is otherwise scheduled to come into force in October.

    (Reporting by Steve Scherer)