Business people and townsfolk joined with workers and pig producers in Mitchelstown in north Cork yesterday to protest at Dairygold's planned closure of its Galtee Meats slaughtering plant in the town with the loss of 170 jobs.
Businesses throughout the town closed in solidarity with the workers as an estimated 1,000 people marched from the main Dairygold plant on the Dublin Road to the centre of town where they were addressed by business, worker and pig producers representatives.
The chairman of Mitchelstown Business Association, Mr Tony Lewis, said the closure of the Galtee Meats slaughtering and boning plant could result in a loss of income in the area amounting to €30 million when downstream jobs were factored in.
Mr Lewis pointed out that Dairygold employed 1,500 people in Mitchelstown up to three years ago, but since then 750 jobs have been either cut or transferred out of the north Cork town. He noted that Dairygold had warned of further job cuts in the future.
"By any standards, this is a huge blow to Mitchelstown and to north Cork and it may be set to continue to the point where upwards of two-thirds of the 3,000-strong Dairygold workforce will be gone at the end of this 'rationalisation' process," said Mr Lewis.
He said that the scale of the job cuts in Mitchelstown was proportionately more devastating than the closure of Digital in Galway or Krups in Limerick, but unlike in those cases, the Government was taking no immediate action to save or replace the jobs.
"We believe that it is a duty of Government not to turn its back upon workers and their families undergoing the hardships of unemployment and we believe that it is a duty of Government not to turn its back on a town and region experiencing the economic meltdown that is now upon us in Mitchelstown and its hinterland," he said.
An employee at Galtee Meats, Mr Tom Twomey, from Kilworth said that the company did not seem to want to sit down and negotiate with workers as they had done oprevious occasions.
"Let's sit down and talk," he said. "we don't want redundancy - we want our jobs.
"I don't want redundancy - I'm 46 years of age - all I know is using a knife, that's all I've ever done for 32 years - what prospects are there for me if I take redundancy?" Mr Twomey asked.
Local pig farmer and chairman of the IFA National Pig Committee, Mr Pat O'Keeffe, said that Dairygold's decision to exit from pig slaughtering at Mitchelstown was a sad day for agriculture in north Cork and the co-op should be developing the pig-processing business, not dismantling it.
Among the public representatives who joined in the march were local Cork East Fianna Fáil TD, Mr Ned O'Keeffe, Fine Gael's Senator Paul Bradford and Kerry North Sinn Féin TD Mr Martin Ferris, as well as local Cork East Labour TD, Mr Joe Sherlock.
Mr Sherlock suggested appointing a mediator to try and work out a rescue package given the willingness of the workforce to enter talks.
Dairygold's chief executive, Mr Jerry Henchy, yesterday issued a statement following a meeting with the IFA National Pig Committee representatives in which he reiterated the company's decision to exit from pig slaughtering.
"It is important that producers who have been critical of Dairygold for its exit of primary pig-processing should look positively at the potential for the added value growth sector in Ireland rather than just on the physical location aspect of where the pigs are slaughtered," he said.
