Some 68 jobs have been lost in the midlands with the decision by Tretorn Sport Ltd to relocate its Portlaoise tennis-ball manufacturing facility to the Far East.
Workers were said to be "shell-shocked" by the announcement yesterday, which follows the loss of 116 jobs at fellow tennis-ball manufacturer Penn Racquet Sports in Mullingar, Co Westmeath, last month.
Tretorn, a Swedish company which was taken over by Puma in July 2001, had signalled it was suffering financial problems before Christmas. But SIPTU's midlands secretary, Mr Mike Jennings, said the total closure was completely unexpected.
"The company had invited applications for voluntary redundancy, and we were quite hopeful it could have staved off any difficulties.
"This is the last thing anyone wanted after Christmas. It has not been handled in a very sensitive manner and that has added to people's trauma," said Mr Jennings.
A spokesman for the company, which yesterday issued a short statement to staff confirming the closure, was unavailable for comment last night.
The closure fits a pattern of job losses in manufacturing, with firms opting to relocate to countries with a lower cost-base. In the case of Penn, management said its move to a sister facility in Arizona was necessitated by a slump in tennis-ball sales and by competition from cheaper Asian rivals.
"For the last 2½ or three years we have been haemorrhaging these kinds of traditional manufacturing jobs, and there is quite a lot of anger, particularly in the midlands in relation to the Government's response," said Mr Jennings.
"The Government seems to have the very laid-back attitude that these jobs were always going to go and will be replaced by high-tech jobs. That thinking is absolutely unjustified because inevitably these jobs will not be replaced."
