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FORMER WORKERS AT the Vita Cortex plant in Cork will bring their six month long sit-in to an end tomorrow afternoon when they leave the factory for good.
The 32 workers have been receiving their redundancy payments from the company owner Jack Ronan in recent days and expect that all payments will have been received by tomorrow, allowing them to leave at 3pm.
A dispute over the terms of their redundancy payments last year prompted factory workers to stage a sit-in which lasted through Christmas and will have reached 161 days by the time it comes to an end tomorrow.
A resolution was reached on day 139 earlier this month but the former workers have continued to occupy the plant while they waited for the payments to reach their bank accounts.
Speaking to TheJournal.ie this evening, former factory employee Jim Power said that the entire workforce was “thrilled” with the news.
“We’ve been saying all along ‘What are we going to do when it all ends?’” he said. “We’ll all go for a bit of grub and a few drinks tomorrow but Friday will be very strange after all this time. People can’t believe it.
“A couple of times over the last few months we were so near and yet so far. I’d imagine that if we did leave on the 16 December (when the sit-in began) it would have been a matter of keeping in contact with two or three but we’ll all be keeping in close contact now.”
Power said that the first thing he’ll be doing is going on holiday, admitting that he’s not sure what he will be doing after that but saying that he would prefer that the younger workers at the plant get a job over him.
He continued: “I can imagine there will be a couple who would prefer to see the younger people getting a chance at work although the job scene isn’t great.”
Power said that the workers had no regrets about staging the sit-in and said that the “incredible” support from people on Facebook and from around the world had kept them going at times when it looked like no resolution to the dispute was in sight.
“Obviously five months can’t be brought back and we lost out on the best part of two seasons. We came away and we’re happy enough but in our minds this should never have happened.
“When we were hearing stories that we were being called blackmailers, that was only making us resist more. It’s amazing how people stuck together.”
Power said that he hoped the endeavours of the Vita Cortex workers will prompt the government into action to prevent anything like this happening again.
But he admitted that disputes such as the one he and his colleagues have been through may become more prevalent now the government has reduced the amount of money which an employer can claim back from the State for redundancy payments to laid off workers.
He added: “Enda Kenny said it was wrong and he said it publicly. The Tánaiste said that it should never have happened. We spoke to everyone but what are they going to do about it now?
“Are they just going to let us sail into the sun or are they going to do something about it? If they were serious, they’d do something.”
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Plastic cards!!! About time, only in Ireland does a student ID look more official then the drivers licence
@ Alan, very true! My friend was in the States and said they don’t accept our drivers license as ID. A joke!
i think they should just ban driving under the influence of alcohol completely, get it over and done with
Good idea but not possible as even using mouthwash or having some sherry trifle would potentially mean you fail a zero level breath test.
Finally. It’s nice to see some initiative & solid action.
Newly qualified “R” drivers will have completed 12 mandatory driving lessons and passed the driving test like everyone before them, I don’t understand the need for restrictions.
The entire driving licence-driving education system in this country is a farce. I obtained my full driving licence after only 3 months on a provisional licence. My driving test was done in the daytime in near-perfect weather conditions. I passed with flying colours. Yet nowhere in my training did I learn how to drive in driving snow conditions, in torrential rain, in icy conditions, in thick fog, at night, or indeed in any combination. Too often I see drivers at night with either no lights on or full headlights coming straight at me. We need to have a proper training system put in place that teaches people how to drive in all weather conditions similar to what is done in Finland (where they have driving centres with roads that have simulated ice conditions, gravel tracks, etc.). “R” licences are a good idea too and certainly lower drink-driving limits, but not just applied to young people – they should be applied to everyone.
how can you have different punishments for the same crime?
A lot of the ideas and initiatives are extensions or modifications to plans that were already in place; I do agree blood alcohol levels should be zero no exceptions and match that with a VRT & Tax exemption on vehicles for pubs who provide local transport. More fundamentally we need to start teaching people to drive in schools as a formal subject with the objective that everyone leaves secondary school with their full license on an ‘R’ plate.
As part of the educational process young drivers need to learn about all aspects of driving from vehicle care & maintenance to driving in difficult conditions. Many young drivers dangerously modify vehicles which can affect the handling, stopping distance and safety features of a car and don’t understand the physics behind the changes or dangerous consequences as a result of poorly modified components.
Maybe then we will see a radical change in driver behaviour and reduced road deaths amongst the most vulnerable demographic in our community. The last element we need is high visibility enforcement; we don’t have it and it needs to be introduced; round the clock checkpoints, mandatory breath testing, and car seizures for non-compliance with road traffic legislation. If we are serious we can reduce road injury & death, lower insurance premiums and be less nervous as our kids head towards driving age.
If a tester believes a person has passed the exam and is capable of driving in an educated, safe and responsible manner there should be no need for extra punishments. I agree with the extra penalty points for learner drivers as I think far too many people get their learners permit and head onto the roads with no training and in many cases no full licence driver.
The thing is people generally don’t do their driving test drunk or pick up their mobile in the middle of it. It’s these kind of behaviours that need to be eradicated from the driving mindset, doing a great U point turn during your test doesn’t mean you wont run someone over while using your phone while driving.
So someone who has their licence for less than 2 years should be punished more severely for drink driving than someone who has theirs for ten?
Don’t see why they couldn’t just set the blood alcohol limit at 0mg/100ml, it’d be a lot simpler than creating three different classes of drivers and different laws for each. The clarity would have benefits in itself.
Because it would mean potentially failing a breath test after you used mouthwash in the morning!
In Finland you have to be tested on a skid pan. And you don’t get to drive on public roads until you have your full licence. The licence test itself takes about 1 year that’s if you pass all the tests, if you fail one you have to start again from the beginning.
Probably a little away from the topic but why not just make it a zero tolerance drink driving policy….it amazes me that all countries don’t have this?
The Road Safety Authority will be put in charge of the driving licence system and the testing of commercial vehicles for roadworthiness.
So what will the staff who currently issue licences do?
And we are still left with 2 vehicle testing organisations.
What a waste of money!
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