Government failed hundreds of Waterford Crystal workers

Last year, presidential candidate Heather Humphreys met with former workers of Waterford Crystal, amidst their decades long battle to obtain their pensions.

In the early nineties, over 400 of the former Crystal employees were misinformed about their future pension entitlements, and were resultingly left without a pension.

The workers claim that they were offered only one pension option at the time – the return of their pension contributions.

They were entitled to receive three options contained on an option form.

The workers assert that none of the more than 400 employees were ever offered these forms, and that no evidence of their existence has been presented since.

“Nobody accepts the fact that what happened to us when we left Waterford Crystal is we did not get the options were entitled to" former Crystal worker Walter Croke told the Waterford News & Star.

“It was established that there was a group of people who never got their options but nobody was ever followed up on it, and we believe the government had a big part to play.” 

The meeting with Humphreys 

In May of 2024, Sinn Féin leader Mary Lou McDonald raised the worker’s issue on the floor of the Dáil.

She asked then Taoiseach Simon Harris to arrange a meeting with the workers.

“They are very angry and they believe, with good reason, that they have never gotten a fair hearing,” Deputy McDonald said.

“The workers say the company misinformed them by offering them only one pension option, that is, the return of their pension contributions.

“The workers say they have never received any paperwork whatsoever outlining all of their options. Surely if proof exists of options being afforded to them, it should be produced but it has not been.

"I ask the Taoiseach to intervene in this very serious ongoing saga.” 

Harris agreed to the meeting, and asked that then Minister for Social Protection Heather Humphreys also attend.

Both Harris and Humphreys met with a group of the workers later that year.

Why meet?

Mr. Walter Croke, who attended the meeting, told this newspaper that Humphreys had previously stated in correspondence that the group of workers did in fact receive option forms.

“We have letters here from Minister Humphreys and all her predecessors, stating in answers to questions written on our behalf, that we got all of our entitlements, that we did sign option forms, and that we had opted to return our contributions.

“But we know for a fact that there were 445 people identified by the pension provider that did not receive these option forms." 

Thus the goal of the meeting was for the Harris and Humphreys to produce a copy of the options forms that the workers were alleged to have signed.

The pair were unable to produce any forms.

Speaking in Dáil Éireann after the meeting, Humphreys said: “This is a long-running issue and is quite complicated.” 

The workers' fight continues.