Thousands of Italians marched in Rome today to protest against the government's austerity measures that include cutting funding to local authorities and freezing the salaries of public sector workers.
The "It's all on our shoulders" protest by Italy's largest union comes ahead of its one-day strike on June 25th against the €25 billion austerity plan approved by prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's government to stave off a Greek-style debt crisis.
The union, CGIL, says the austerity measures are unfair, with a disproportionate share of the pain borne by the poor working class. The labour group has almost 6 million members, over half of whom are pensioners.
Students, retirees, temporary and public workers marched through central Rome holding aloft balloons and red flags, while some played music and football as the procession came to an end.
"There is a part of the population -- mainly public workers -- but also private workers who pay heavily. The sacrifices are practically made by them alone," said Guglielmo Epifani, the head of the CGIL union.
"There's another part of the country that is not called to make the sacrifices it could have."
The union said about 100,000 Italians were at the protest. The figure could not be independently verified.
The demonstration won the backing of some opposition parties like the centrist Italy of Values and the Communists organisation but has not garnered support across the board, in a sign the government will be able to implement the measures without major difficulties.
Reuters