Summary
Was he a great entrepreneur... or did he just ride FF's building boom? THE company that Presidential race frontrunner Sean Gallagher boasted had created 100 jobs now employs just 20 workers, the Irish Mail on Sunday can reveal.
Half an hour into Wednesday night's Prime Time debate, Mr Gallagher once again talked up his job-creating and entrepreneurial skills, saying: 'I created almost 100 jobs in Co. Louth.' A minute later, he went even further: 'I went on to create more than 100 jobs, contributed a huge amount to the local economy.' When it was pointed out to his campaign team that it had been previously reported that his electrical wiring company, Smarthomes, employed only 70 people, his spokesman said: 'It was 70 direct jobs but 30 subcontractors.' Mr Gallagher stood down as managing director last year, selling his shareholding for an undisclosed sum and handing over the reins to Eamon Conway, who admits the company's previous core business 'ticks over in the background' with just 20 employees. He said: 'The business isn't as big any more - there used to be 80,000 houses being built in Ireland, now there's four or five thousand.' Started in 2002, within two years Smarthomes had turned its first EUR 1m as it expanded rapidly on the back of high demand for its cabling technology from developers.See the full content of this document
Extract
[Eire Region]
In 2006, Bertie Ahern cut the ribbon at the company's new headquarters in Finnabair Industrial Park...
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