Debenhams workers are still on the pickets
By Maurice Garvey
FORMER staff at Debenhams held a major picket at The Square on July 18, to mark 100 days of fighting for a “fair redundancy”.
Make that 132 days and counting, as the fight goes on every single day, with no sign of let up.
PROTEST: Debenhams workers protesting on Tuesday at The Square
On Tuesday, Carol Quinn, former shop steward at Debenhams Tallaght said: “We are still here on the pickets – hail, rain or snow we won’t be letting the stock out (of the store in Tallaght), no way.”
Rumours amongst the picket are that Sports Direct plan to move into the former Debenhams Tallaght unit.
Over 1,000 staff from 11 Debenhams Irish stores are calling on the joint provisional liquidators to the Irish arm of the company to help resolve their demands for a redundancy package.
The campaign goal is to secure four weeks pay per year of service, as opposed to the basic two week statutory minimum currently on offer, which would add €13 million to the cost of redundancy.
The protest chant in Tallaght and elsewhere on pickets is ‘2 + 2 = end’ – a reference to demands for an additional two weeks redundancy payment on top of the statutory payment they are entitled to.
On Tuesday, former Debenhams workers in Cork protested outside the offices of KPMG in Dublin city centre, acknowledging they are “creditors in this liquidation.”
In July, former Tallaght Debenhams staff stepped up the pickets 24/7 at the carpark delivery entrance to the shopping centre, in an effort to prevent stock from the store being removed to the UK.
Workers believe stock in Irish stores – valued at €19m-€20m by liquidators KPMG – should be going into the Irish pot and not moved back to the UK.
“We want to see this through now, we are at this over four months,” said Ms Quinn.
