Republican News · Thursday 4 April 2002

McGuinness welcomes Ardagh settlement

Martin McGuinness MP has offered his congratulations to the workers in the Ardagh bottle factory in Ringsend. McGuinness and the Dublin South East Sinn Féin candidate, Daithí Doolan, had met with the workers and union and had discussed the threatened closure of the factory. SIPTU workers voted 2:1 last week in favour of accepting proposals which kept the factory open.

"I congratulate the workers and I also recognise the sacrifice they have made in accepting these proposals," said McGuinness.

Daithi Doolan, who had several meetings with the factory workers and the union representatives said he was pleased with the outcome. "It's not completely ideal but it is better than the alternative which was closure and a loss of 375 jobs," he said. "The repercussions of that would have been felt by more than the 375 workers. It would have had a profound effect on the entire community. So I would like to commend the workers for keeping the factory open. It was a difficult solution for them to swallow. I hope the government has learned something from this and at least makes some kind of an effort in the future to avoid the development of situations such as this."