A SCAFFOLDER who refused to climb down from a 40m tall crane at a Dublin building site yesterday in protest over pension payments finally returned to street level six hours later, when the firm in charge of the site agreed to his demands.
Paul Hansard (49), from Marino, said he climbed the crane at the Seán O'Casey community centre site in East Wall at 8am yesterday as the culmination of a month-long dispute with site contractor PJ Hegarty & Sons and a Northern Ireland scaffolding firm.
He finally climbed down just after 2pm, after Dublin Fire Brigade officers had fitted him with a safety harness and rope.
Mr Hansard, who is also a senior union official with Siptu, said that the Northern Ireland firm GMac Scaffolding was not paying pension entitlements on the site.
Mr Hansard said he had been fighting for the pension payments for about a month. GMac finally responded to his requests yesterday by bringing in another team of scaffolders.
"I could not live with myself working with a non-compliant sub-contractor," he said.
Mr Hansard made an on-the-spot decision to climb the ladder, he said. "When I got halfway up I was thinking about turning around," he said.
While he stood on top of the crane, Siptu officials negotiated with Hegarty. They agreed to take GMac off the site, according to Siptu assistant branch organiser Joe Harris.