Aughinish Alumina Jobs at Risk as Intel Invests €5bn in Ireland

As I say, Kevin Doyle, Noelle O'Connell and Harry Browne still with me in studio.

Kevin, the government seems to be trying to occupy two positions at once, that it wants to be supportive of Ukraine, doesn't want to do anything to independently support or indirectly support Russia and to support the jobs in Limerick.

Is it plausible to be able to do both?

Not really.

This is the problem of parish politics meeting the geopolitical landscape, where we have people like John and the politicians in Limerick very understandably arguing that the jobs are really important to that region and that it would be devastating for the South West if those jobs were gone.

On the other hand, you have Micheál Martin, who's wandering around European capitals as effectively the president of Europe.

for six months, trying to articulate a position that I think if it were any other country, our government would be calling for a halt to this.

So John says it's not black and white.

It is actually quite black and white, but we're trying to create a grey area because we don't really want to be honest about it.

The government have probably done quite well to keep a lid on this for several, several years, but it has come to a head now, especially with Zelensky in Dublin at the start of the European presidency.

I'll

come back to that with Noel in a moment.

But what do you think has changed in the last four years when Ukraine launched its full-scale invasion in March of 2022? Michail Martin and Leo Varadkar then as the minister, not alone were trying to stop there being European sanctions against the plant.

They were even engaging with Washington to try and stop Washington from sanctioning Rusal, the ultimate owner of the plant, to try and keep the jobs open.

What do you think has changed in the last four years that they're now taking the standoff approach that we're not going to nationalise, we can't guarantee the jobs, we'll just see what happens, come what way? Why do you think they're so reluctant now?

Well, I think two things have probably happened.

It's gone on for so long that it's become more noticeable now because there have been lots of sanctions on lots of different areas and it's kind of one of the last outstanding things that seems to have been overlooked, if you like, for that long period.

The other thing is that there is a war in Gaza that the government have been so outspoken and taken the absolute moral high ground on, which is absolutely fine.

That is the choice and backed probably by the majority of the population.

But you're putting the Occupied Territories bill through the door with pretty much full support because it has no real financial consequence.

It won't cost any jobs.

And then you have this other thing, which it seems for all intents and purposes, and I expect we'll get the report in the next few days, it seems proven that something bad is happening here that is aiding Russia.

But yet we're not willing to shout the same halts or find legislation

or a way out of that.

Noelle, Kevin mentioned the call from Vladimir Zelensky and it was a pretty pointed one.