Tara Mines workers vote to accept deal on temporary closure of facility

Staff at Tara Mines have voted in favour of the deal reached between management and unions with regard to the temporary closure of the facility, which is due to take effect on Friday.

The agreement, reached after three days of talks at the Workplace Relations Commission last week, provides for a range of supports to those impacted by the closure including a weekly payment of €65 for those not retained during the period of “care and maintenance”.

Provisions were also made for sick pay, health insurance and death-in-service benefit payments.

The deal also provides for reviews of the closure - which owners Boliden have said is necessary because of increased costs and a decline in the international price for zinc – and a guarantee that workers will retain current terms and conditions upon reopening.

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The first meeting between management and staff representatives to be held under the terms of the agreement will take place on July 25th.

All three unions with members among the 650 staff at the company – Siptu, Unite and Connect – are understood to have endorsed the deal which had been recommended to workers. In Siptu’s case the vote is said to have been roughly 60/40 in favour.

Siptu, which represents some 450 of those affected, “will now embark on a major campaign to bring unemployment benefits in line with the EU norm. The reform of our grossly inadequate and unfair social protection system should be the lasting outcome of this dispute,” said the union’s division organiser Adrian Kane.

He said that Ireland’s current system was completely outdated and plunged workers who lost their jobs below the poverty line as many were left with just €220 in weekly social welfare payments, something he described as a “cliff fall in income”.

He said the Government has previously given a commitment that it would address the situation and that it now needed to act urgently to provide more appropriate supports. “They showed they could introduce new payments almost overnight when the pandemic struck and they need to show the same sort of willingness to help people who have lost their income now.”

Speaking on RTÉ radio, meanwhile, he described the blow of Tara Mines’ closure to the economy of Navan and the surrounding area as being “line an economic pandemic”. Asked if he believed the mine would reopen, he said that it was the company’s position that the closure is temporary and the union continues to work on that basis.

A full review of the closure, which is expected to consider the changing levels of costs and potential income as electricity and zinc prices change, is due to take place in October.