Direct Holidays says closure is temporary

REDUNDANCY PROTESTS:THE CLOSURE OF the Dublin premises of the Thomas Cook subsidiary Direct Holidays is a temporary measure, the company has said. This week it also changed the locks on the travel agency, on Talbot Street, as a security measure.

Direct Holidays is due to close its Irish branch at the end of the month. A spokesman for Thomas Cook said the move was aimed at avoiding a repeat of the events of last week, which led to the arrest of almost 30 former staff.

The spokesman said: “It is a security precaution for staff and customers who are walking into the premises to avoid the situation on Grafton Street being repeated.” The spokesman said that the situation would be reviewed early next week but that the store was likely to open again in the coming days.

Former staff at the Thomas Cook branch on Grafton Street were arrested and later released without charge over their defiance of a court order to vacate the premises. The protesters had been staging a sit-in in objection to the terms of a redundancy deal.

Workers at the Direct Holidays premises had also staged a sit-in, but they abandoned it last Monday, before the injunction was secured against protesters at the Grafton Street premises.

Talks began on a new redundancy deal on Wednesday, but the workers’ union claims that Thomas Cook has not offered a revised deal.