Thank you for trying to help us.

It is very hard to continue our “battle” after so many years because we are now exhausted. I have two children and it is more difficult to resist. My salary at the University of Naples is only 500 euros a month.

At the start of my university teaching career 18 years ago I taught 18 hours per week. After our various court cases here at Naples the University reduced our total working hours and we are now on just four hours per week. Meanwhile, as foreign-language teaching needs keep rising, the University has taken on extra teaching staff to meet these demands but at a salary which is three times less than ours. And since we are living at a time of great labour crisis, the University was able to find people willing to work at those rates.

For years we have worked in unthinkable conditions. Thirteen years ago, when my first daughter was born, I had no right to maternity leave and had to take her with me to University to breast-feed her in order not to lose any working hours. My baby sat with a babysitter in the room next to where I was holding my course and when she needed feeding, I left the room for a quarter of an hour to do this. My Italian colleagues knew what we were living through but few had the courage and the sense of honour to speak up for us.

Today I think that if our “problem” does not find a rapid solution I shall be forced to abandon the fight since one has to live.

Yours sincerely,

Marie-José Nervi

University lecturer in French

Naples, Italy