“In an exceptional situation, we demand exceptional solutions,” OGBL central secretary Stefano Araujo hammered home on Tuesday 22 April. Together with the LCGB, the union had called Liberty Steel employees to a rally in front of the ministry of the economy, taking advantage of the monthly meeting of the economic committee. In the end there were around forty people present from 8.30am, employees and union representatives.

Among them was Hubert, a 30-year veteran of the plant and a member of the delegation bureau. “I’m a French resident and so far I've been living off my savings, but I should start receiving unemployment benefits from May onwards as normal.”

, the legal amount owed by the employment fund in the context of a bankruptcy has indeed been paid, as has the balance of all accounts. But for cross-border employees living in France in particular, “the situation is very complicated,” Hubert continues. “We’ve even lost our social security rights because we no longer have a Luxembourg contract. So some people can no longer get medical treatment in Luxembourg.”

A former employee living in France, who has 24 years of seniority, even admits that she “hasn’t done [her] shopping for several months, because I’m a single mother and I have too many charges to pay. Fortunately, I have friends who help me out on a daily basis so that we have something to eat.”

On the Luxembourg and Belgian side, former Liberty Steel employees started receiving their unemployment benefits several months ago, “but it’s still a loss of earnings because we don’t get the amount of our former salaries. Our charges, on the other hand, haven’t decreased,” says a Belgian resident.

“That’s why this meeting was so important. There are a number of possible solutions, but we need to discuss them. All employees are in a precarious situation. In France, there is a discrepancy in compensation, with some people receiving their compensation and others not depending on their notice period and seniority,” adds Robert Fornieri, member of the LCGB management committee.

“We also need a solution to get the business going again, we have an incredible opportunity with a buyer who is there, who wants to invest, develop and take over the employees. If we don’t seize this opportunity, it will be a missed and shameful opportunity. Two governments and six ministers have succeeded each other since this shameful dossier with Liberty Steel began,” he continues.

A deadline of 31 May

A buyer was indeed . The ministry of the economy confirming at the time that “the bid from the Turkish group Tosyalı Holding has been retained by the curator and that an application for admission to the related economic activity zone has been submitted.”

Contacted on several occasions by Paperjam, the group did not respond to our questions.

The deadline of 14 February for filing a business transfer application--three months after the bankruptcy--had been extended, at the request of the Turkish group. “The deadline has now been set for 31 May, but what are the employees supposed to do in the meantime?” asks Hubert. “In France, if you turn down a job twice, you’re struck off [and stop receiving unemployment benefits, editor’s note]. We’ve already been in contact with the intermediary of Tosyalı Holding, Steel Investments. They are serious buyers and it would be a real shame to miss this opportunity.”

Araujo confided on Tuesday 22 April that “officially, the buyer has informed us that he intends to finalise the sale by mid-May. The problem is that this process is taking too long for the employees, and even if the buyer’s intention was to move quickly, we are still waiting. We have asked the authorities to speed things up and make things easier.”

Although economy minister  (DP) was not present at the meeting on Tuesday 22 April, being on a working visit to Cabo Verde, labour minister (CSV) was. He explained that “the government is aware that we need to find a solution, that your situation is very critical, tiring, even impossible. It’s also unprecedented, unique and we’re going to learn lessons from this whole story, but a new law can’t be drawn up in a fortnight. Let me remind you that we have invested €12m in the site through various measures, including immediate payment of the bankruptcy indemnity. Through the director of Adem, , we have contacted the Grand Est director of France Travail, but for the moment we don’t have a miracle solution.”

Liège site also bankrupt

“We need to reform the legal framework. A legislator is not only there to apply laws, but also to reform them or to create an appropriate legal framework. So the responsibility also lies with the government in this case, the European Commission, the government and all the players even if they have been with us from the start,” insists Fornieri.

And his OGBL counterpart Araujo adds: “We are not equipped for this transitional period, between a bankruptcy where contracts cease and a sale where there is a transfer of activity where contracts are revived. Between the two there is nothing but unemployment and we can see that these are tools that are not adapted to the situation, especially in a context of heavy industry with a timeframe that is different.”

Of the 147 employees remaining at the time of the bankruptcy (the site had 280 employees in 2019), around ten have since retired, and a few have found other work. “All the others are waiting, between hope and fear,” confides another French cross-border worker. Liberty Steel also has a site in Liège, Belgium historically attached to the Luxembourg site; its full name is Liberty Liège-Dudelange. The 550 workers at the “Flémalle and Tilleur plants have not been paid since the end of the year. The company has been at a standstill for more than two years,” wrote the Belgian media outlet RTBF on 12 April. “At the end of March, the court appointed a provisional administrator for the Liège subsidiary of the Romanian group Galati. On Friday [11 April, editor's note], at an extraordinary works council meeting, the decision was taken to propose the silent bankruptcy of Liberty Steel in Liège.”

This article was originally published in .