Michael Donnelly has worked hard to set up his own concrete pumping business. Photo / Greg Bowker
Michael Donnelly has a broken back and two paralysed legs - but that hasn't stopped him going into business this year as a concreting contractor.
Mr Donnelly, 39, from Henderson, often falls out of his wheelchair as he shuns safety wheels at the back to give himself maximum
freedom on work sites.
But he shrugs it off, saying he can't feel anything when he falls.
He stations his wheelchair next to his concrete-pumping machine on the road while able-bodied employee Phillip Rust drags the hose into place.
His company, i-pump, is a success story for Work and Income's enterprise allowance scheme, which paid Mr Donnelly a subsidy of $200 a week for the first six months after he started the business in April.
But now he's striking out on his own. "Finding work is the hardest thing, mate.
"Especially when you're in a wheelchair - because they don't think you are going to have the ability to do the job," he says.
"I go and see people and try to get work to prove that we are a credible business."
He has won contracts from the big concrete suppliers - Atlas, Firth, Holcim, Stevensons - as well as private clients.
A former panelbeater, fisherman and heavy machinery contractor, Mr Donnelly was paralysed in a motorbike accident eight years ago.
He was refused accident compensation and survived on sickness benefits until he went self-employed.
"It's taken me a while to get everything up to scratch and ready to go out, physically and mentally," he said.
He bought the equipment from a friend who moved to Australia, but it was "in a dilapidated state" and he had it repaired and repainted.
He did a Be Your Own Boss course through Work and Income which taught him how to market himself, do the books and analyse his strengths, weaknesses and opportunities.
He has had help from Mr Rust, from Murray O'Neill of M and W Contractors - who has a big pumping business and gives i-pump work when he is over-busy - and from his former boss Wade Martin, of Martin Panel and Paint.
"Without those guys," Mr Donnelly said, "it would have been really hard to get started."
* i-pump, 0276-445-485.
