Dara Calleary (Mayo, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate the range of responses from the Minister's Department and I am aware of the early warning system in place. The specific circumstances of the case at Bausch + Lomb were known in the Department and its agencies, but the workers seemed to be the last to know. They were then presented with a Hobson's choice and forced to take difficult reductions. I congratulate everybody involved in that process, including the Department, SIPTU and various employers, to try to achieve a resolution. However, the workers were presented with a choice of either accepting pay cuts or having the entire operation shifted. That is an unacceptable and very difficult choice to have to make and the workers were placed in a no-win situation. As I have said before, I do not think the outgoing CEO of IDA Ireland was helpful in that regard. It was his job to try to assist the company, but he told workers to take the deal on offer. This was particularly unhelpful and unfair and I do not want to see it happen again. Workers should not be placed in a difficult position in having to take decisions that will affect their personal lives. In taking such decisions they are put under the microscope and there is enormous publicity and pressure, knowing that their decision will affect 1,000 others. Is there a way by which the Department, working with various agencies, can ensure what happened will not recur?

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