Ballinasloe jobs blow hits close to home

The expected shutdown of one of Ballinasloe’s few remaining big employers is a massive shock for its 120 workers – but for some it’s the second body blow that threatens to turn their lives on their head.

Because while Mary Dunican is one of the Aptar employees facing redundancy, her husband Tom is equally uncertain about his future after 40 years with Bord na Móna in Shannonbridge.

They’re not the only couple left to wonder how they’ll support families, a mortgage and loans – but the news on Aptar, so soon after Shannonbridge, has left them reeling.

“There are two of us here facing only one thing – the dole queue, and the dole queue won’t pay the bills, the mortgage and the car loans,” said Tom.

Mary joined Aptar, then called Valois, 14 years ago, a couple of years after she had been made redundant from her job in Square D – another multinational that pulled out of Ballinasloe in 2003, leaving 385 people out of work.

“I worked in Square D and it was pulled from the town once they got all their grants from the IDA. Aptar is here 20 years; the question is, are they moving because they’re getting no more money from the IDA?” asked Mary.

News of Aptar’s impending closure surfaced last week, and while management at the multinational informed its workforce that it was to begin a 30-day consultation process, an internal memo that leaked this week appears to render that process a cosmetic exercise.

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