SHOPPERS looked on horrified as a man staged his second protest on a town centre rooftop in a week.

The 34-year-old clambered up scaffolding on a building in Knowsley Street, to begin a five-hour sit-in next to a chimney 80ft up on Saturday afternoon.

After demanding to see his girlfriend, the man - dressed in a dark blue jacket, jeans and trainers - smoked cigarettes while police pleaded with him to come down.

His protest came to end after he agreed to climb aboard a hydraulic platform after three attempts by specially-trained police negotiators to reason with him.

Each time the man demanded that his estranged girlfriend be brought to the scene.

He was brought down to the ground at around 2.30pm and taken to Royal Bolton Hospital, where he has been detained for treatment.

The man staged a similar protest on the roof of the Francis Bleasdale Dance School on Tuesday last week.

He talked to negotiators for 90 minutes before agreeing to come down.

A Greater Manchester Police spokesman said: "The gentleman was involved in a domestic dispute and was refusing to come down."

Sub officer Ian Ainsworth, of Bolton Central Fire Station, said: "We were providing support to the police and their negotiators to allow them to get closer to the gentleman, and from our point of view the outcome was a success."

A police spokesman said it was rare that partners would be brought to the scene of an incident.