Govt to 'tighten screws' on vouchers

(ANSA) - Rome, March 1 - Labor Minister Giuliano Poletti said Tuesday the government will intervene in the coming weeks to "tighten the screws" on the use of 10-euro vouchers to pay for occasional work. "We don't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater," he said, adding that while vouchers have "positive aspects" they can also give rise to "illegal or improper behaviors - (which) we want to eliminate". INPS pensions and social security agency said last month that more than 115 million work vouchers were sold in 2015, or 66.1% more than in 2014. CGIL union federation chief Susanna Camusso commented those figures by slamming the vouchers as a "a negation of labor" and as tools to de facto push workers off the books. "Vouchers are not traceable," she said. "They have been used in farming, tourism, and a series of sectors in which there used to be seasonal, organized labor, which has now disappeared".