EMPLOYEES at the Semperit tyre plant in Dublin are expected to accept the company's revised redundancy package. A ballot on the package will be completed tomorrow.
Voting on the offer began yesterday after a mass meeting of the workforce in a Ballyfermot social club at which the union explained the new terms.
The company has offered an extra £6.3 million in redundancy payments, the full terms proposed by the Labour Court. Earlier, the German owned company had indicated it would not go beyond the terms it had offered in previous redundancy packages at the plant.
After the mass meeting, Mr Jack Nash, a SIPTU regional secretary, said balloting on the proposals would finish tomorrow. He added that the company had moved the closing date forward from December 6th to Saturday.
Meanwhile, Semperit's parent company, Continental AG, has agreed an urgent review of the proposal by an American company, Cooper Tire, to buy the factory. Continental's chairman, Mr Hubertus von Grunberg, agreed to the review after a meeting on Sunday in Hanover, Germany, with the Minister for Enterprise and Employment, Mr Richard Bruton, and the chief executive of the IDA, Mr Kieran McGowan. Mr Bruton was seeking Continental's co operation with the IDA to sell the plant to Cooper Tire.