The Irish question - it's no joke

Two unemployed Irishmen walked past a sign saying 'Tree fellers wanted' and one of them says.... Oops. Let that be un-said. With Trevor McAuley having taken his case to the Commission of Racial Equality and won a victory over Irish jokes, we'd better not tell you the rest.

The Irish make up a substantial part of construction's workforce and the outcome of the McAuley case provoked reaction throughout the industry.

Digginwell of south London has a workforce that is almost entirely Irish. 'We all laughed when we read the McAuley case,' says director Mike Guyer. 'The fact is that our people prefer to work in gangs with a good joke teller. Sure the lads tell Irish jokes against themselves - then they tell English jokes against me.

'At Digginwell, the best joke teller of us all is Frank Bradley, the md. He's brilliant. He ought to be on Opportunity Knocks - couldn't CJ organise a competition?

'Seriously though, McAuley did have a case but it wasn't the jokes, rather the fact that people were making his life perpetually difficult. We wouldn't tolerate that. Employers must be sensitive to staff who get bullied, even verbally.'

Chris Cosser, a shop fitter with Amos Danby of Southampton, is currently working in the High Street, Sutton, Surrey, where a team are doing a re-furb for opticians Spec Savers.

'That bloke (McAuley) was petty and naive,' reckons Cosser.

'We tell all sorts of jokes here. All races. All creeds. And mother-in-law jokes too. It's just part of construction. There's no malice, it just helps the day go by. I mean, you can't talk about work all the time can you.

'It's a pity John Bardye isn't here today - he's Danby's best joke teller.'

Directly opposite Amos Danby's site was a straight-faced construction team from Wallace of Maidstone, Kent. 'We don't like journalists,' snapped the foreman at the dusty doorway to a scaffolding-coated Barclays Bank, while labourer Bill Bennett confessed: 'Me, I don't know any jokes.'

Further up the High Street humour was again held on a tight rein. Ted Cranfield, safety officer with Ardmore Construction, caught in the midst of a roofing restoration project, said: 'Ardmore has 350 staff and 99% are Irish. We won't tolerate Irish jokes, it's in our disciplinary procedure. We've had no disciplinary cases for the last two years.'

Harry Roberts, site safety supervisor, also with Ardmore, recalls: 'I was with the firm up on a West End site one time and we had two men disciplined for telling Irish jokes. It did the trick - there were no more.'

At Wimpey there are no specific guidelines on telling Irish jokes, while a spokesman for contractor J Murphy reports: 'We take no notice of these things. Irish jokes are around all the time, they brighten the day.'