Ballybrack Three - Building row must not hit partnership

WHATEVER the rights and wrongs of the case involving the jailing of three Dublin building workers, it has inevitably focused the spotlight on mounting concerns about the competing rights of employers and employees in the Irish workplace.

In a week that saw tens of thousands of workers take to the streets of Strasbourg, Dublin and other cities in protest against what unions see as a cheap labour directive by the EU, the case of the Ballybrack Three is stirring wider arguments.

Essentially, the three men were jailed for contempt of court last Friday after refusing to obey an order restraining them from picketing a building site at Ballybrack in south Dublin. Having failed to get work there, they allege they were discriminated against because they were locals and members of the Building and Allied Trades Union (BATU).