Minister for Jobs, Innovation and Enterprise Richard Bruton has asked the Labour Relations Commission to be on stand-by to intervene in the dispute over redundancy payments at Vita Cortex.
32 workers at the Cork plant, which produced foam for the packaging industry, are in their third week of a sit-in since production ceased there in mid-December.
Vita Cortex claims money to fund redundancy payments for the workers is frozen in an account which is now controlled by the National Asset Management Agency, but NAMA says that money is needed to pay the company's debts.
This evening Mr Bruton called for workers at the plant and the company to use the State's industrial relations machinery to explore ways of resolving the dispute.
Earlier, Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin described the treatment of the Vita Cortex workers as disgraceful and called on Minister Bruton to meet them.
