Going concern hope for IFI plants

TÁNAISTE Mary Harney says she’s hopeful a liquidator will be able to sell off some of IFI’s plants as going concerns and thus save the jobs of some of the 620 workers who were to be made redundant.

The Tánaiste made the comment during a meeting with union leaders yesterday.

She also informed them that IFI’s two shareholders, the Government and British multinational ICI, would if necessary put extra money at the disposal of the liquidator to ensure adequate redundancy packages for those laid off at the Cork, Arklow and Belfast plants.

“We would certainly welcome any possibility that the liquidator could sell off parts of the company as a going concern which would lead to workers keeping their jobs,” the SIPTU national industrial secretary Noel Dowling said.

However, he was critical of Mary Harney’s decision not to throw a lifeline to the company.

It emerged yesterday that IFI management had asked both shareholders to put up an extra €5m each on top of its €31m cost-cutting plan to keep the company going, a plea which she refused.

“The Tánaiste made it plain that short of the company coming in with a plan which would return it to full profitability then she would only be throwing good money after bad,” Mr Dowling said.

The Tánaiste had previously claimed the State had already ploughed €750m in taxpayers’ money into IFI since the company was founded in the later 1950s.

“We (the unions) let the Tánaiste know we placed the decision to liquidate IFI firmly at her doorstep,” Mr Dowling said.

A spokesman for the Tánaiste said that even with an injection of €10m by the shareholders, the company was still forecasting a €7m loss next year.

“The Tánaiste made it clear that there would be a significant amount of money made available for redundancy packages,” the spokesman said.

He said it was likely that IFI creditors would appoint a liquidator within the next two weeks.