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THE FUTURE OF House of Fraser’s Dublin outlet hangs in the balance after British group Sports Direct acquired the troubled department store’s UK assets.
In a statement to the London Stock Exchange, Sports Direct, which is majority owned by Newcastle United proprietor Mike Ashley, said it has snapped up House of Fraser for a cash consideration of £90 million.
It said it has acquired “all of the UK stores of House of Fraser”, the company brand and all of the stock in the business.
A spokesman for Sports Direct confirmed to Fora that the deal excludes the chain’s Dundrum Town Centre outlet, which casts doubt on the future of the Dublin outlet. The company also operates international outlets in Abu Dhabi and Nanjing, China.
Earlier today, House of Fraser – which was controlled by Chinese conglomerate Sanpower prior to the Sports Direct buyout - announced that it was planning to enter administration.
The 169-year-old firm, which has department stores dotted mostly across Britain and Ireland, currently employs about 17,500 staff. Some 6,000 jobs were previously on the chopping block in an overhaul that had been unveiled in June.
At the time, it said it was shutting 31 of its 59 stores. Its Dublin and Belfast units weren’t marked for closure at that stage.
Lost investment
House of Fraser revealed last week that it had lost a proposed investment from the Chinese owner of Hamleys and was looking for a new rescuer.
The group had announced a drastic restructuring after agreeing a 51% sale to China’s C.banner International Holdings, which already owns the London toy retailer Hamleys, for £70 million.
However, C.banner said a slump in its own share price had rendered the transaction “impracticable and inadvisable”, and it axed the deal.
UK-based retailers with large amounts of stores are suffering from fierce online competition from the likes of Amazon, while battling against discounting in big supermarket chains.
Bankrupt British budget chain Poundworld collapsed earlier this year with the loss of some 5,100 jobs.
It was announced yesterday that the Irish family that set up the pound shop chain in the Republic agreed to buy the remaining stores from the troubled retailer.
Meanwhile, thousands of jobs have also gone with the demise of clothing outlet Calvetron, Toys ‘R’ Us toy chain, Maplin electronics stores and Warren Evans bed manufacturers.
Additional reporting by AFP.
Written by Conor McMahon and posted on Fora.ie
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Good for them. I hope that they and their pupils don’t suffer in spite of the violence.
Nuns and priests have been doing this since start of christianity no matter how much the media want to portray the 2-3% pedos who deliberately sought out positions of influence over children and the sinful corrupt hierarchy as being christian or the norm of the rest of the 97-98% decent christian church.
1 in 10 priests in most major cities investigated Steven, not 2-3%. Thousands and thousands of kids with major top down disregard when the information was brought forth. But fair play to these nuns. That’s what it’s supposed to about. We have a nun in the family and we love her dearly, a purer, more lovely person you could not meet.
@Conor Brady…………Investigated! Nebulous remark. Try something with more credibility to it such as below and link to more.
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…”Written By Bob Allen
The Associated Press reported recently that three insurance companies receive upward of 260 reports each year of young people under 18 being sexually abused by Protestant clergy, challenging the assumption that clergy sexual abuse is an exclusively Catholic problem that does not take place in other churches.
That is a higher number than the annual average of 228 “credible accusations” brought against Catholic clerics in records reported by the Catholic Church in response to media scrutiny, a priest observed in a Fox News commentary questioning why the story isn’t garnering more attention….”
https://www.facebook.com/notes/leonard-alt/147-protestant-clergy-abuse-equals-or-exceeds-catholic-clergy-abuse/431640530219229/
@Conor Brady
“Pedophilia (the sexual abuse of a prepubescent child) among priests is extremely rare, affecting only 0.3% of the entire population of clergy. This figure, cited in the book Pedophiles and Priests by non-Catholic scholar, Philip Jenkins, is from the most comprehensive study to date, which found that only one out of 2,252 priests considered over a thirty-year period was afflicted with pedophilia. In the recent Boston scandal, only four of the more than eighty priests labeled by the media as “pedophiles” are actually guilty of molesting young children.”
Source: non-Catholic scholar, Philip Jenkins
“advocates for the victims of clerical sex abuse continue to argue that the church plays down the true scale of the problem. Barbara Dorris, outreach director of the Survivors’ Network of those Abused by Priests, said on Sunday that BishopAccountability.org, a website that attempts to document abuse cases and apparent cover-ups, had figures suggesting that the proportion of US priests accused of abuse from 1950 until 2013 was about 5.6%.”
People like this are the reason the world is still worth caring about
I am not a fan of the religious orders but fair dues to those nuns
Woman of Ireland, your glory’s in the shade.
All the red thumb liberal brigade should ask themselves if they would sacrifice their personal pinko safety for others like these nuns. These women are part of a proud real Irish legacy and real socialism
I am proud of them.They deserve every support from our Govt. to ensure their safety.
I was very lucky to have known Orla in my college days and she was a fantastic, funny, very intelligent and extremely caring person back then. It seems her selflessness has only grown. Imagine being here safe in your home country with your family and doing everything you can to get back to a war torn country to help others?! I am in awe of this woman and those that work with her. Good luck to them. My prayers, for what they are worth, are with you.
Very noble but with all the money we spend in that region of the world i would have thought hunger was last on the list ?
Europeans have spent trillions helping the 3rd world, we have let millions, the most able the least poor into our countries on the basis of false emotional blackmail, while the most wretched and downtrodden are still in Africa, yet somehow it is never, never enough, and the white man is still racist. #BlackLivesMatter
Those girls won’t brainwash themselves I suppose.
Before anyone is tempted to reply, don’t feed the troll. They grow stronger with your attention. Yes I’m aware of the irony in this comment
Yet you managed it all on your own Tariq.
As an Athiest I fully support the irish nuns presence, the indoctrination of the poor uneducated and helpless into the peaceful religion of Christianity is the best defence against the spread of the Islamic Cult.
Iran and North Korea left for the central Bankers and its mission complete. South Sudanese had the misfortune of not having a central bank controlled by the private banking Cabal. They will have one when the blood letting is done and more innocent people have been wiped out due to criminal bankers.
Cool story bro
There’s still nuns
Interesting observation.
My own powers of observation lead me to conclude in addition, they are not Imams.
have your say