Italy is looking at a "hot summer" of strikes by transport workers, union leaders warned yesterday amid unconfirmed reports that Alitalia, the state-controlled flag-carrier was close to bankruptcy, would be broken up with the loss of thousands of jobs.

"We are not like British trade unions," Mauro Rossi, head of the transport division of the leftwing CGIL federation. "Our capacity in Italy to mobilise the unions is still sufficient," he told the Financial Times.