A Dublin building subcontractor has responded angrily to criticism of the industry at the Irish Congress of Trade Unions conference in Killarney this week. He accused the general secretary of the Building and Allied Trades Union, Mr Paddy O'Shaughnessy, of misrepresenting the situation by claiming that some employers were resisting legitimate trade union aspirations by resorting to legal action.
The chief executive of Kilburn Developments, Mr Martin Young, said yesterday that he was one of a number of builders who had to resort to the courts over the past year because of disruption caused to his operations by members of BATU and others.
Mr Young, who has four sites in Dublin where work has been affected by unofficial pickets since early May, has served claims for substantial damages on the union and two of its members.
"I am not suing bricklayers as an employer," he said. "I am suing people who do not work for me, some of whom are bricklayers, because their protests are seriously disrupting my operations," he said. He had only resorted to legal action a month after alternative methods to resolve the dispute had failed.
Mr Young said he was a former member of the BATU executive and many of his employees were BATU members. On one occasion, because of the activities of unofficial pickets, it had taken gardai over two hours to secure access to a site for men who wanted to work. The picketers are demanding that McNamara's, the main contractor on sites where Mr Young has work, employ bricklayers direct. Both McNamara's and Kilburn Developments have issued proceedings against individual picketers and BATU.
Mr Young would not say how much he is seeking in damages from BATU and the bricklayers concerned, but he said his losses ran to well over £10,000 a week.
Mr O'Shaughnessy has confirmed that the union was served with writs by both companies, but said that it was not involved in the dispute.