Irish to rescue call centre workers

1st Line workers were shocked to be made redundant

Offers of work appear to be flooding in for 2,000 call centre workers made redundant in Cardiff and Swansea this week.

The former 1st Line mobile Communications employees are being approached by other call centres in south Wales, who are keen to fill vacancies.

British Gas said it is looking to fill 20 jobs a week over the next few months.

Insurance company Admiral has said it will try to recruit some of the Cardiff workers for its call centre.

An Irish call centre employer is one of 15 companies searching for staff at Swansea job centre's open day, which takes place on Saturday.

Wicklow Recruitment is looking for staff for a number of companies of all over the Republic of Ireland.

They are not actually visiting Swansea but have asked the job centre there to deal with collecting applications from people.

Managing Director James Arnold says Wales and Ireland have long-standing cultural links - the work ethos is similar and there are no problems with work permits or language.

A 1st Line worker reads the redundancy notice

In the last 10 years, unemployment in the Republic of Ireland has fallen from 16% to 4.6% and employers are desperate to fill vacancies.

About 60% of companies have vacancies all over southern Ireland.

One of the employers is a bank in south Wicklow which has 4,500 call centre positions to fill.

Jobs range from seem-skilled to management and professional, production technology, quality control and engineering with many of them in the IT industries.

Wicklow Recruitment is keen to recruit large numbers of workers because they said it is more cost effective to transport them over.

The company is offering to do this free of charge for the workers.

1st Line, which sold mobile phones, announced it had ceased trading on Wednesday.

The news came as a shock to the 2,000 workers in Cardiff and Swansea who were not told until they turned up for work.

The Cardiff and Newport Call Centre Initiative, which supports the growth of the call centre industry in south Wales, is also having talks with other companies to find alternative employment for former 1st Line workers.