No progress was reported yesterday in talks at the Joint Industrial Council of the ESB on the Ferbane power station dispute. The board of the ESB is expected to cancel a £16 million renovation programme for the station if the dispute is not resolved by the next board meeting on October 16th. In that event Ferbane would close, with the loss of 114 jobs.
The dispute is over the planned merging of duties involving three instrumentation technicians with those of electricians at the plant. Over 85 per cent of the workforce has accepted the new work practices, but talks spread over seven hours at the JIC yesterday failed to meet the requirements of the three instrumentation workers and their union, MSF.