The abrupt closure of an Ennis printing plant with the loss of 41 jobs was yesterday described as "reprehensible" by a senior SIPTU official.

SIPTU branch secretary Ms Mary O'Donnell made the comment as the former staff at the Graham & Heslip plant picketed the premises yesterday in an effort to secure wages and redundancy payments owed to them by their former employer.

Outside the plant yesterday former employee Mr Ronan Wryn said: "We were told on Friday afternoon by management that the company was closing straightaway and we were given 10 minutes to collect our personal belongings and go. Unfortunately, without really thinking about it, we did."

Mr Wryn, who worked at the plant for the past six years, said that the staff were owed two weeks in wages, statutory redundancy and holiday pay by the company, which also operates a plant in Belfast. Graham & Heslip purchased the plant two years from Thermo Foil Print.

In all, Ms Colette Kelly worked at the plant over a 14-year period. She said yesterday: "I am the main earner in the family, with two children and a mortgage to support. It is disgraceful and shocking what is going on."

She added: "I worked here for a long time and I didn't even get a phone-call from management that I had lost my job."

Mr Tony McMahon worked at the plant for 18 years. He said: "I'm dumbfounded. You would think that when a company is in trouble, efforts would be made to cut costs, go one week on, one week off, but not to close it down without any warning," he said.

Efforts by staff and SIPTU to contact the managing director of the plant, Mr Ken Cleland, were yesterday proving unsuccessful. A spokeswoman at the company's Belfast plant told The Irish Times that Mr Cleland was unavailable for comment yesterday on the situation.

The closure of Graham & Heslip is the latest jobs blow to Ennis. Yesterday Independent TD Mr James Breen demanded intervention by the Tánaiste, Ms Harney, on the issue.