GROVE Turkeys Ltd MD Tom O Driscoll has confirmed to the Post that the Smithboro plant will not close and that the remaining 70 jobs are secure. Despite planned talks with a County Council delegation and Union officials, management said the decision to axe 130 jobs is final.

Mr O Driscoll said that while Grove deeply regretted the decision, they felt they had no other choice as the very survival of the company is at stake and it was either 130 job cuts or closure. “We did everything in our power to maintain year-round production and I would like to pay tribute to the efforts of our staff in this regard. I am pleased to be able to say that our action now, necessary and painful though it may be, will ensure that this Turkey production tradition continues into the future.”

Smithboro and the wider community were shocked to learn of the planned slashing of over half of the workforce as announced on Friday last, 1 February. Mr O Driscoll has told local staff and suppliers that the Irish poultry industry has suffered rising costs and has been “under severe competitive pressure” from overseas producers, forcing them to implement a radical rationalisation programme by this Easter and a seasonal production cycle supplying Easter and Christmas markets.

“Overseas producers have a phenomenal advantage in terms of costs and we haven’t been able to compete with this during low seasons,” Mr O Driscoll stated. In the past ten years, the number of licensed slaughtering facilities in Ireland have halved due to such intense competition.

A vital local industry, the factory employs about 200 office, line and managerial staff. However, this number does not reflect the wider local economic benefits generated by Grove through the support of the 85 poultry farmers which rear and supply the turkeys for the factory and local feed suppliers.

Grove staff previously suffered a 3-day-week from January until Easter 2007 and staff had feared for their jobs at that time, as exclusively reported by the Post. Union officials had then voiced concerns that this previous situation heralded the beginning of a slowdown in Grove’s production.

The company also guaranteed they would fulfill all their commitments to staff made redundant as required under the Transfer of Undertakings Act.

This further jobs blow came only days after 30 jobs were slashed at Irish Joinery Limited which blamed the downturn on the housing market.