Ireland

Tara Mines set to reopen after workers vote to accept deal

Agreement provides for ‘very significant’ levels of change and job losses but should provide ‘certainty’ for more than 400 workers

Tara Mines workers during a protest over its temporary closure outside Leinster House last year. Photograph: Gareth Chaney/Collins Photos

Emmet Malone
Fri May 3 2024 - 12:13

Members of the three unions representing workers at Tara Mines have voted to accept an agreement intended to provide a basis for a phased reopening of the facility from next month.

All three ballots produced result in favour of acceptance with Siptu, which has the largest membership at the company and whose members stand to be most impacted by the provision in the deal for a further 150 job losses, declaring a two-to one-margin (67 per cent to 33 per cent) in favour of acceptance.

Members of Connect, which represents a smaller number of tradespeople at the mine, voted 79 per cent to 21 per cent while the vote among members of Unite was 72 per cent to 28 per cent in favour.

“This has been a really, really difficult time for people who have been asked to take on a very significant amount of change to the way they work and accept a very significant number of redundancies but the unions have worked hard to obtain the best deal possible for their members in the circumstances and I think that is reflected in the results of the ballot,” said senior Siptu official Adrian Kane.

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“The outcome should at least provide certainty regarding the mine’s future,” he said.

Welcoming the outcome of the ballot, Gunnar Nyström, general manager of Tara Mines, said the result was “welcome and will enable us to move forward. We will now begin the process of reopening and employees will commence their return to work on a phased basis. We will communicate next steps with our employees in the coming weeks. We look forward to welcoming them back to work.

“The last number of months have been very difficult for our employees, their families and the wider community. I would like to thank our employees for their patience during this difficult period,” he said.

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Minister for Enterprise, Trade and Employment Peter Burke also welcomed the decision by a majority of the company’s workers to accept the deal.

“The closure of the mine since July last year has had a significant impact on workers and their families, and on the wider community in the region,” he said in a statement.

“I want to commend all parties for the efforts that they have made to ensure a positive outcome in difficult circumstances. Government will ensure that all available supports are put in place for workers that choose to take voluntary redundancy, including supports for retraining and job search assistance.

“Tara Mines is a major employer operating in an important sector and the Government is committed to exploring the possibility of strategic supports to incentivise longer term investment by Boliden in Tara Mines.”

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Under the terms of the deal, it is envisaged there will be about 160 jobs losses on top of the roughly 50 people who have left the company since the mine was closed on a temporary basis last summer.

There will also be substantial changes to rostering and other work practices as well as new arrangements with regard to outsourcing.

Core rates of pay are understood to have been preserved, however, for future entrants as well as current staff and some of the measures put forward by the company in its rescue plan will not now be adopted.

Production at the Boliden-owned facility in Co Meath was shut down last July with the then workforce of 650 workers temporarily laid off after what the company said were “significant and unsustainable financial losses” amid soaring energy prices and falling zinc prices globally.

[ More than 150 jobs to go in deal to reopen Tara Mines ]

Tara Mines subsequently reported 61 per cent decline in revenues for last year, driven by the lower zinc prices, lower metal grades, a weaker US dollar and lower production due to the suspension of operations.

Emmet Malone

Emmet Malone

Emmet Malone is Work Correspondent at The Irish Times

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