Reaction:Workers at Allergan in Arklow were yesterday coming to terms with the announcement by the company that it is to close its plant in the town by the middle of next year with the loss of 360 jobs.
The workers at the breast implant manufacturers were told that the company is moving the operation to Costa Rica.
At an emergency meeting of Arklow Town Council, hastily convened to discuss the situation, it emerged that members of the workforce had been sent to Costa Rica to train the people that are now going to take their jobs.
Local resident Charlie Austin said the loss of the Allergan plant was going to be a huge body blow to the town. "It will be particularly devastating for the workers, especially those with mortgages and the Government needs to come up with a plan to ease the burden on them and ensure that their homes are not repossessed."
Publican Brian Murphy said the closure was going to have a terrible effect on the business and morale of the town. The workers are nearly all local and it goes without saying that the business of the town is going to be affected.
"It is well known that any redundancies have a knock-on effect and it is said that one redundancy leads to the loss of another job too. The town is nearly back to where it was in the 1980s after large-scale factory closures and job losses and I would be concerned that we may not have hit the bottom yet."
Councillor Nicky Kelly of the Labour Party described the news as a very sad occasion for Arklow. "Over the years Arklow has suffered a number of major blows regarding job losses. This one is particularly devastating for the workers and their families, especially people who have taken out mortgages.
"There is no hope that the company decision will be reversed and the plant is being closed to facilitate cheap labour in a third-world country. That was why Arklow was losing jobs today."
Fine Gael councillor Donal O'Sullivan said Arklow was losing jobs faster than anywhere else and action was needed. "We do need a taskforce to be set up, we all need to put our shoulder to the wheel to get replacement jobs."
Councillor Peter Dempsey (Independent) said Arklow had been let down by the Government and all politicians. Arklow people were now spending the equivalent of two days each week on the road travelling to jobs in Dublin.
Allergan was one of the few remaining manufacturing plants left in Arklow, the town having already lost more than 5,000 industrial jobs over the last 25 years - the latest being the closures of the IFI fertiliser factory in 2002 and Arklow Pottery/ Noritake, each of whom employed some 1,250 workers at their peak.
At yesterday's meeting the council decided to seek an urgent meeting with Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Micheál Martin and the IDA to press for a taskforce to address Arklow's jobs deficit. Arklow had been promised 147 new jobs from the decentralisation of the Standards Office but that did not materialise.