Terms on which Boliden Tara Mines workers to be laid off referred to WRC

The Workplace Relations Commission has been asked to host further talks between management and unions at Boliden Tara Mines after the two sides failed to reach agreement on Thursday on the terms on which some 650 staff are to be temporarily laid off.

Members of the company’s management met representatives of Siptu, Unite and Connect on Thursday but little progress appears to have been made.

“There is still a significant gap between the parties,” said Siptu’s Adrian Kane afterwards.

There is due to be further engagement on Friday between the two sides on the issue of staffing levels at the mine during the “care and maintenance” shut down. The company had suggested on Wednesday it envisages 40 full time equivalent jobs to be maintained over the period of the closure with the unions arguing that when the facility last closed, at a time when it was significantly smaller, the corresponding figure was 140.

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The Minister for Enterprise, Simon Coveney, is also due to meet the unions involved on Friday when the issue of what Government supports have been offered to the company since the original company announcement was made earlier this month is likely to be raised again.

Answering questions from Labour’s Ged Nash in the Dáil on Thursday Mr Coveney said officials from his department had met the company earlier this week and he, accompanied again by some department staff, had held talks with Boliden management on Wednesday.

The Minister told Mr Nash that he had received repeated assurances that the company expects the mine to reopen and that the closure is a temporary measure which Boliden puts down to a combination of raised costs and low zinc prices.

Pressed on whether there had been substantial follow up on the suggestion by the Taoiseach two weeks ago that significant help might be provided by Government in relation to electricity costs, Mr Coveney did not mention any specifics and said there were limits to what the Government was in a position to do.

“The predicted loss for 2023, when the decision was announced a number of weeks ago that the company was going to move into care and maintenance, was approximately €100 million. That is a huge gap to close. The one factor the Government cannot compensate for is the price of zinc, which is the main factor here.

“What we can do is support the company somewhat to offset the dramatic increase in the cost of energy which, by the way, is not as dramatic as would have been predicted six months ago. In fact, the cost of energy has come down significantly, but it is still a lot higher than would have been predicted a number of years ago.

“We can, therefore, do something on energy. There are some limitations in terms of state aid rules and the schemes that exist but certainly, we cannot close that kind of gap.”