Mallow sugar factory closure a mistake

A restructuring of the sugar-producing industry led to the closure of the Mallow sugar factory in 2006 but it has now emerged that the factory was profitable and should not have been shut down.

The EU auditors looking into the case said the factory was actually profitable at the time its gates were closed in 2006.

The closure led to the loss of 240 jobs.

In a shocking development, the Court of Auditors found that the European Commission was working off old figures for Ireland when it carried out its damning analysis four years ago. The numbers it used did not take into account Greencore’s consolidation, which came about after it closed its Carlow plant.

It has also emerged that Europe no longer has sufficient sugar supplies and has to import from outside its member states.

The EU court has one Irish auditor, Eoin O’Shea, on its committee and he told the Irish Examiner that the Mallow plant was worth €150m annually to Irish farmers and should not have been closed.

"Without the sugar reform the Mallow plant would still exist and farmers would still be growing crops to supply it," he said.

Speaking today in the Dáil, Mary Coughlan who was Minister for Agriculture at the time said the reform of the sugar regime came as a result of a WTO investigation.

The WTO said the EU sugar industry was illegal because of the massive subsidies to factories which kept sugar prices in Europe up.

Coughlan was adamant in the Dáil today that she had opposed the EU and WTO proposals.

“I opposed, as minister for agriculture at that time, the commission’s proposals, which you all know yourselves, and led the group of 14 in their opposition to that reform,’’ she said.

The Dáil debate then became quite heated, with some politicians asking for other business to be held over so Coughlan could answer more questions.

Labour agriculture spokesman Sean Sherlock said the Tánaiste needed to give “an account of her actions” and asked “why a Fianna Fáil government consigned an industry to its death?”

source: businessandleadership