Stellantis workers making the famous Italian vehicle Fiat are struggling to pay the bills after spending a year on lower-paying furlough, a union official has warned, in a stark reminder of the human cost of Europe’s EV slowdown.

Stellantis placed around 2,400 Fiat workers in its main Turin factory on furlough with reduced pay in September last year as it reduced manufacturing of its Fiat 500 city electric car and two Maserati sports cars.

In February the automaker said employees at the Mirafiori plant would work reduced hours, in a single-shift operation instead of a double-shift.

Workers on furlough earn around €1,100 per month after tax, compared with €1,600 when they were in full employment. A representative for Fiat’s FIM Cisl union says the shortfall is starting to affect the finances of the manufacturer’s older-skewing workforce.

“We have been through ugly periods,” FIM Cisl rep Davide Manago told Reuters.

Furlough pay is often “not enough to pay the mortgage, and going to the bank to ask for loans to put food on the table was not easy,” Manago said. “My fear is going back to that.”

The Mirafiori plant is one of the oldest in Europe, but it has fallen in significance as popular cars are built elsewhere in Italy. Its employees, on average, are between the ages of 57 and 58, the union noted, and younger workers aren’t coming in to take their place.

In June, Fiat CEO and Stellantis global CMO Olivier Fran?ois visited the Mirafiori plant in a bid to reassure workers about their future at the company. The new Fiat 500 Ibrida is set to be built at the factory in 2025 and 2026.

In February, Stellantis discussed the potential for Chinese Leapmotor cars destined for Europe to be made at its Mirafiori plant as a way for its Chinese partner to avoid hefty import tariffs set to be implemented by the European Commission.

Stellantis bought a 21% stake in Leapmotor in October last year, making it one of several European carmakers to form alliances with Chinese suppliers over fears they could be wiped out by their competitors’ low prices.

The plight of Fiat workers in Turin serves as a warning for the rest of the European car market, which employs nearly 14 million people.

German giant Volkswagen is pushing to weaken the resolve of its powerful works council as it seeks €10 billion in cost savings. The carmaker ended its 30-year labor agreement to secure jobs, and floated the idea of closing a German factory for the first time in its history.

Stellantis’s Italian battle

Stellantis, which was formed in 2021 through a merger between Italian-American Fiat Chrysler and France’s Peugeot-Citro?n, has butted heads with the Italian government in the past year amid debates over the origin of its cars.