Dan Boyle (Cork South Central, Green Party)

I am grateful for the opportunity of raising this issue which, because of the length of our summer recess, has lost some of its immediacy but has lost none of its importance. I am further grateful that my constituency colleague, the Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment, has chosen to respond to this issue. I know he shares my concerns, not only as a Minister, but also as a constituency Deputy, about what will happen from here. That is the motivation for my having raised this issue today.

We need to address the loss of 146 jobs at the Archer-Daniels-Midland Company, ADM, in Ringaskiddy and the replacement of gainful, long-term employment for those concerned. There are ongoing difficulties that need to be examined in a wider context and I am prepared to debate them at another time but I do not think there will be any disagreement between the Minister and myself as regards to a necessary response to this set of workers.

I would like the Minister to respond concerning the amount of foreknowledge that might have been available to his Department and other State agencies concerning forthcoming difficulties that may provide workers in such situations with a better sense of preparedness. As a constituency colleague, the Minister will be aware of industrial difficulties that existed in the recent past that resulted in a lock-out of workers in this particular factory. The management cited economic difficulties and the need to change the cost structure, which in itself was a warning sign.

As a Green Party Deputy, I am quite prepared to acknowledge the degree of environmental difficulties, although I do not believe they are linked to the commercial or economic difficulties, but were themselves another signal that there were wider problems with the company concerned. In order to avoid similar circumstances arising in future, I would like to know what kind of early-warning systems exist. How do the Minister's Department and State agencies respond to such warning signals? How can workers who might find themselves in such a situation be given sufficient advance notice in order to find alternative employment? I suspect the Minister will reply by citing his other efforts, which I welcome, including the new positions that will be found in the Centocor factory and the opening of the Recordati factory in the next few weeks.

I am not making the argument about additional jobs, however. We are talking about a specific set of people who have worked for ADM which is not a pharmaceutical company per se, but a food additive one. It was established as part of a wider facility that was Pfizer's and then became Archer-Daniels-Midland. Therefore, something that had been part of a wider whole, became a separate entity but has now ceased to exist.

Two issues need to be addressed by the Minister and his Department: first, the 146 people who have lost their employment and, second, the existence of an industrial installation in that area that could be put to alternative use. There is a history in Cork South-Central of working collectively to address those issues. I am grateful the Minister has attended the House to outline how we as constituency Deputies, including himself as the Government Minister responsible, can respond to this issue.

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