Greencore boss Patrick Coveney has admitted the sandwiches and wraps-maker has grown less optimistic about the chances of a smooth and orderly Brexit and is putting greater emphasis than before on planning for a hard or no-deal outcome.

GREENCORE has a corporate and moral obligation to malting barley growers to resolve the issue of their contracts, farmers claimed yesterday. They were protesting at the company’s extraordinary general meeting held in Dublin to approve the sale of its malting business to French co-op Axereal.

GREENCORE, the world’s biggest maker of prepared sandwiches, has been in the news for all the wrong reasons lately.

A LEADING Catholic bishop said yesterday that Greencore’s refusal to abide by a Labour Court ruling on redundancy payments to its former workers at Irish Sugar in Mallow cannot be morally justified.