IDA accused of failing North Tipp

The Industrial Development Association (IDA) has been accused of failing the North Tipperary region due to the lack of investment by overseas investors in recent years, in what local representatives describe as a once thriving industrial region.

The era of factory towns dotted across North Tipperary before the turn of the century is fondly remembered by many local people as the golden-age of a strong partnership between community and local industry; which employed great numbers of local people, often across the generations in the same workforce.

That employment and economic shift in the last three decades has seen an exodus of pharmaceutical, food and manufacturing companies to foreign countries and left in its wake many dilapidated and unoccupied industrial buildings in town centres.

Towns like Roscrea  and Thurles earned a reputation as the hardworking powerhouses making up the backbone of Ireland's economy - success stories which local representatives feel can be resurrected and returned to work.

For that to happen they feel their constituencies need more support and promotion from the IDA and this week local representatives from Thurles and Roscrea heaped criticism upon the organisation for what they described in unison as "failure".

Arguing that a continuing trend where the lion's share of foreign investment is going towards the southern end of County Tipperary, some local Councillors went so far as to call on the local authority to sever their relationship with the IDA completely and "look elsewhere".

The scathing criticism came during the monthly meeting of Tipperary County Council in Nenagh on Monday, when IDA representatives Denis Curran and William Corcoran attended the meeting to give a presentation and update on the IDA's promotion of Tipperary to potential foreign investors.

They both stressed there has been a 35% increase in the number of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) jobs in Tipperary - bringing the total number of people filling such roles to over 4,500. Successes such as Fiserv in Nenagh are a good example of how the IDA has brought jobs to North Tipperary, they said.

But the omission of details on Roscrea and Thurles provoked the ire of several councillors. Councillor Seamus Hanafin said Thurles is one of Tipperary's biggest towns, located close to the motorway network and with two university status education centres and highly skilled workforce - yet the IDA has failed to bring any industry into the town.

Cllr. Sean Ryan, whose father worked in Erin Foods in Thurles for over 30 years, said the town was built on industry and has slipped into a downward decline he fears it may never recover from.

Councillor Michael Smith said he feels the IDA has failed Roscrea so badly that the town and local authority "should abandon the IDA and look elsewhere". The failure to attract an occupant for the fully serviced Benamore site on the outskirts of Roscrea highlights that failure, he said.

Questioning how many visits to Roscrea by potential investors in Benamore have been made since it was purchased in 2016 "to much fanfare", Cllr. Smith said he can't understand how Roscrea - a town which will soon have Ireland's second biggest solar farm and huge green energy output from the Monaincha wind farm - cannot attract a major industry.

He said there has been no concentrated effort to promote Roscrea and criticised their failure to visit the town - sentiments echoed by Cllr. Noel Coonan who said Roscrea has a site with motorway connection to the tarmac at Shannon Airport - yet it has not attracted an FDI company in years.

Former industries such as Antigen and Offray provided good jobs for local families and Cllr. Coonan said neighbouring towns like Birr and Portlaoise appear successful. "What are we doing wrong - or is there anything we can do to help make our towns more attractive?" he asked.

Cllr. Coonan said Templemore is particularly affected because lands zoned for development were sold. "In Roscrea and Templemore we feel like the forgotten towns", he said.

Denis Curran, Head of Regional Development for the IDA, said Ireland and Tipperary "have to go out and fight and compete as a country every day, week and month against 150 other countries for investment".

He said companies often look at regions instead of focusing on singular towns and that trickle down benefits to indigenous companies such as FRS Recruitment in Roscrea and the local economy benefit the entire area.

"We must combine geographies and bring down the barriers of provincial towns or counties - the language we use and the position we use extend above and beyond any particular town or one particular county", Mr. Curran said.

"To get on the shortlist to compete for investment we must represent the region as a collective and as a whole to give some sense of the sale of clusters and abilities that reside within a certain location. It's important that to secure jobs we look at the big picture in terms of scale and opportunity", he said.

CEO of Tipperary County Council, Joe McGrath, said the local authority have a "very good and strong working relationship with the IDA, which often happens behind the scenes".

He said Tipperary has benefited from some overy strong FDI investments in recent years and that people need to remember many of them are in "expansion mode" and always growing. He said the Council wants to acquire more land  and expand and wants to see more FDI announcements for Tipperary.