Thank you, a Cheann Comhairle, for having selected this topic for discussion.
The matter to which I refer is the impending closure, announced two weeks ago, of Irish Crown Cork Company Limited, with the loss of 110 jobs. Will the Minister for Health inform me what action has been taken by the Minister for Enterprise and Employment within those two weeks to avert this closure? Has the Minister been in receipt of a report from the IDA on the matter? Has the Minister or any official of his Department visited the plant to assess the position? Did the Minister or any of his officials travel to the United States in an attempt to persuade the parent company to reconsider its decision or did the Minister just wash his hands of the whole matter like a latter day Pontius Pilate?
What would the Minister for Enterprise and Employment have done if this or a similar plant had been located in his constituency? The workforce at Cork Crown comprises mainly women, the majority of whom are the sole breadwinners in their households. What kind of Christmas will these workers and their families have? It is particularly poignant that the doors of that factory are due to close on 20 December, five days before Christmas, when all families endeavour to provide a little extra for their children. Yet those 110 families are being condemned to having a little less. Somehow it smacks of the worst practices of the 19th century.
Unemployment in the Churchfield area of Cork stood at 41 per cent prior to the announcement of this closure. Moreover, unemployment in Cork City has risen by 2 per cent in the past year and has increased constantly in the three years 1994, 1995 and again this year so far. This is in sharp contrast with what we are told is happening in other regions where we hear frequently of new industries being located and many new jobs being created. Not alone is Cork not getting any new jobs, it is losing existing ones, the retention of existing jobs is just as important as creating new jobs. Unemployment on the north side of Cork city stands at approximately 28 per cent while unemployment on the south side stands at 16 per cent.
I call on the Minister to urge his colleague, the Minister for Enterprise and Employment, to take immediate action. He must direct the IDA to double its efforts to salvage this industry. If such efforts fail, he must immediately find an alternative industry for the plant on that site. Moreover, he must instruct the IDA to adopt a hands-on approach in obtaining additional new industries for the Jobstart on the north side of Cork city.
I appeal to the Minister for Health to use his influence with the Minister for the Environment to have work started on the Blackpool bypass, an essential precondition to the development of the north side of Cork city. Unless that bypass is constructed the north side of Cork city will continue to be bypassed by domestic and overseas job-creating investors.