You also omitted to recognise in your post that AZ, like most Government Organisations anywhere in the world is grossly overstaffed and has very poor productivity.
BUT, the Unions (Your Representatives?) should have recognised an opprtunity to transition to better management and the need to make concessions to reduce excessive jobs, in the greater interest of the majority.
With all respect Philipat, in common with most other posters here you've fallen for the oft-repeated lie that AZ's problems lie in overstaffing and bloated staff costs. This mantra has been repeated so often (by successive Italian governments, AZ managements and immediately parroted by Italian/world media) that it has become a cliche'; too bad it's DEAD WRONG.
It's a bit like blaming the loss of a war on the troops, instead of the the generals. Facts:
-AZ has a lower employee/aircraft ratio, as well as a lower employee/pax carried ratio than AF, LH, IB or even BA. These employees are, on average (especially on the sharp end) paid less than in other european majors (although BA comes close). Fact.
-AZ's cost of labour has recently been
below 20% of total operating costs, while LH/AF/BAs is and has always been well above 20% (from respective 2007 yearly reports). In fact the only overpaid AZ employees are its top managers, who in the last few years have been paid more per year than LH/AF CEO's COMBINED. Fact.
-AZ's yearly losses over the last few years (pushing 600 million euros a year recently) have even exceeded the total cost of labour: in other words, even if ALL of AZ staff (from their cheapest new-hire temp to their grossly overpaid CEOs and managers) were to work FOR FREE, AZ would still end up posting a loss at the end of the year (still think AZ's problem is staff costs and productivity?)
During the process of considering a takeover of AZ in March this year, even Air France's CEO Spinetta publicly noted that contrary to popular wisdom, AZ's staff costs were not its problem.
Don't get me wrong, there are certainly improvements to be made in AZ's staff costs and numbers (and especially in some staff's attitude to customer relations), but blaming AZ's demise on staff numbers/costs is like blaming a cold for the death of an AIDS patient; sure, the cold got him in the end, but he sure as hell wouldn't be dead from a cold if he didn't have HIV.