Kilmainham jobs ‘a vote of confidence’

THERE was good news on the employment front for the Southside last week with the announcement that US multinational Parexel plans to create 130 new jobs in Dublin by January 2017.

The 130 new jobs announced for Kilmainham has been described as a great vote of confidence in the local economy by Fine Gael TD for Dublin South Central, Catherine Byrne.

“Today the Minister for Jobs Enterprise and Innovation, Ri-chard Bruton, announced that Parexel International Corporation, a leading global biophar-maceutical services provider, is opening a new global decision-making hub in Kilmainham.

“This will mean the creation of 130 new jobs in areas such as clinical, technology, legal, consulting, and logistics. The jobs will be created over the next 12-18 months. The company already has 70 employees so this an-nouncement will bring their total workforce in Kilmainham to 200.

“Since the launch of the Gov-ernment’s Action Plan for Jobs in 2012, the Live Register in Dublin has decreased by 17.5 per cent. It is great to see Kilmainham benefitting from this increase in employment with these IDA sup-ported jobs. It is also important to remember that for every 10 IDA jobs created, a further seven jobs are created in the local economy thanks to the positive knock on effect.

Deputy Byrne added: “The Government has a plan to replace all of the jobs lost in the economic crisis by 2018. We reached our target of creating 100,000 jobs ahead of time and we plan to create 40,000 new jobs this year alone.

“This requires a targeted approach and Minister Bruton has said that the life sciences sector is one of the areas which we have targeted for jobs growth in the Action Plan for Jobs. We can see with today’s announcement in Kilmainham that this approach is really paying off.”

Sinn Féin’s Cllr Máire Devine also welcomed the news.

“The decision of the biopharmaceutical firm to expand its business in Kilmainham area is good news for local community,” she said.