THE nine staff of the Park Inn, who are protesting against the decision to shut the pub down without notice, where overwhelmed when up to 300 people from the community came out in a show of support.

Young and old, family and friends and other supporters arrived in droves to show their solidarity to the staff at a public demonstration, which was held outside the front doors of the pub at 6pm on Wednesday evening.

Addressing the crowd Duty Manager Derek Ryan said the sight of the hundreds of people that surrounded him was “overwhelming and fantastic”.

He outlined that the staff were told without warning that the pub was shutting its doors for good at a meeting on Tuesday morning.

Shouts of disgraceful echoed through the crowd as Mr Ryan explained that even though all parties were happy with an offer that was made on the pub the bank turned it down.

“I won’t go into figures but it was a substantial bid that was put in. The pub would have stayed open. All staff would have full redundancies and entitlements and some would have even kept their jobs and the others would have walked away with their heads held high. This wasn’t enough for the banks.”

Holding back clear emotion Mr Ryan said, “Now it has come down to nine people losing their jobs.”

Tom Hogan addressed the crowd and said UNITE Trade Union is delighted to lend its support to the worker’s cause. “The action that they took in response to the treatment given is the correct action to take.”

He said UNITE will make a financial contribution to the staff if the sit in continues. “We will be calling on other workers in the town to do the same thing… Solidarity is the most important thing here.”

Full coverage in the next edition of the Waterford News & Star