Seagate staff to receive up to €29,000 each

THE 900 computer workers in the North who are to lose their jobs at Limavady-based Seagate have been told they will receive a favourable redundancy package as much as £20,000 (€29,000) each — but only if they stay until it closes down.

The workers at the Derry company have each been offered six weeks’ pay for every year they have worked at the plant, but only if they stay until July.

If they leave their jobs before then, they will get four weeks’ pay for every year they have been employed at the factory.

The factory, which began production in 1997, currently employs 768 permanent and 159 temporary workers. It makes computer hard-drives and other information storage products.

Seagate is closing its Limavady plant in the second half of next year. However, the company’s nearby facility in Springtown, Co Derry, which employs almost 1,400 people, will continue to operate.

Staff at the Limavady factory were told on Monday they were losing their jobs.

Dr William O’Kane, plant manager at the Limavady factory, said that the company “deeply regretted” having to take this action. He blamed a number of factors, including lower labour costs of its competitors, foreign exchange movements and higher shipping and utilities costs.

Seagate has a plant in Malaysia which is due to start operations in the new year. It will make the computer components being made in Limavady.

Seagate employee John Spangler told the BBC they did everything they could to keep the factory going.

“We wanted to make a go of it, we’ve investigated numerous ways to keep that plant open and we want to keep it open for the next nine months,” he said.

“Hopefully we can come up with some ideas that still might save it but right now it doesn’t look viable.”