Big Brexit jobs boost set for Rosslare Europort
GOVERNMENT sources have confirmed to this newspaper that between 150 and 200 new roles will be required in the general area of customs at Rosslare Europort to address issues relating to Brexit.
However, the President of the Irish Road Haulage Association, Verona Murphy, has said the status of the port needs to be upgraded immediately to ensure available funding can be accessed with a view to developing the port in an appropriate way.
At the cabinet meeting last week Minister Paul Kehoe expressed concern over Rosslare and highlighted the need for extra infrastructure to cope with the thousands of security checks that will have to take place once Britain exits the EU.
According to Minister Kehoe four times the number of checks could be required post-Brexit depending on the outcome of negotiations.
According to Ms Murphy around 150,000 trucks pass through Rosslare Europort each year on a roll-on, roll-off basis with lift-on, liftoff traffic coming into the south east through Waterford Port.
‘Post Brexit the traffic through Rosslare will increase as it’s the shortest land-bridge route and makes a massive difference for drivers in terms of driving time,’ said Ms Murphy.
She highlighted the fact that the majority of traffic coming through Rosslare are inspection related because of the high concentration of meat and fish processing plants in the south east region,
‘Around 70 per cent of the traffic coming in requires inspection,’ she said.
While the Government announced last week that around 1,000 jobs will be created at Irish ports as a result of Brexit the majority of them will be in Dublin, however, Ms Murphy estimated that around 200 new roles will be required in Rosslare Europort.
‘There will be five Government agencies operating there,’ she said.
However, she said the status of the port in Rosslare needs to be upgraded immediately or it will have a major detrimental affect on the county and the region.
‘It needs to be changed from Tier 2 to a Tier 1 port because there is a plan in place to develop it and it’s ready to go but it needs Government sanction and that hasn’t happened so it needs to be upgraded as a matter of priority because if it doesn’t happen that development will not take place,’ she said.