- Re: Romanian workforce on our farms Archived Message
Posted by Ian M
on April 17, 2020, 12:02 pm, in reply to "Re: Romanian workforce on our farms"
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Heard about this yesterday on the radio and had to laugh at the insanity of it all. I hope the Romanian workers managed to negotiate some better wages. It sounds like they're still getting charged £50/week for their accommodation, typically mobile homes or other v basic housing. The websites I looked at offer minimum wage of £8.70/hr but it's piecework so the best workers can earn up to £14-15/hr. If new workers aren't up to speed they're let go after a trial period. I signed up to the HOPS scheme http://hopslaboursolutions.com/seasonal-work/ but only got a message back saying they were swamped with applications and would get back to me, and now I see they're booked up for April but May is a possibility. Followed a torygraph article to this site which has contact details for individual farms doing berry harvests: https://www.britishsummerfruits.co.uk/jobs Most got back to me, some with auto replies, some saying they were booked up, others that that they'd have something later in the season. A lot of the replies were signed off with east european names (a few with english-sounding surnames, revealingly enough) - I guess there's a need for secretaries with language skills to communicate with workers who don't have much english. In the end I finally got offered one of the organic veg-growing seasonal roles I applied for back in March, so I'll miss my opportunity to see what commercial scale picking work is like. Which is slightly relieving as I'm not sure how well I'd cope with picking the same fruit day after day, week after week. Though the camaraderie of working in a big team could be nice. Here's one of the replies I got: 'X Farm is a small family farm [at a location]. We grow strawberries and blackberries for sale to UK supermarkets and caterers. The Crops - All our crops are grown under tunnels so you are protected from rain - Strawberries o All strawberries are grown in bags, mostly on tabletops, so they are picked standing up. Fruit is large, sweet and good shape. - Blackberries o These crop from July to September. They are large , sweet fruit and the canes do not have thorns The Work - Most of the work will be picking strawberries or blackberries. This is HARD WORK - Other work may include planting, weeding and other general farm jobs - It can be very hot or cold and the temperature can change a lot in a day. English weather is very unpredictable! - We normally work up to 8 hrs/day for 6 days/week - Work starts around 6am. If the weather is very hot work could start as early as 5am. - We pay on a bonus scheme so the best people will be able to earn well above the National Living Wage - All workers will earn at least the National Living Wage, currently £8.72/hr - Owing to the nature of the work our contracts are zero hours but we try our utmost to ensure work is available - We provide all necessary training - If you are unable to meet our production targets after a training period of 1-2 weeks, we may have to ask you to leave Wages - All wages will be paid weekly into a bank account. If you do not have an account we can help you to set one up. We do not pay in cash - Deductions for accommodation, tax and national insurance will be made in line with UK law The Campsite - Accommodation (if required) is in mobile homes, which are basic but clean. Each has a living area and 2 bedrooms - normally 4 people per van - each van is equipped with a microwave oven, fridge, kettle, saucepans, cutlery and crockery and electric heaters where required. The vans do not have running water inside but there are communal kitchens and a central shower/toilet block. - The accommodation cost in 2020 is £6.50/day with electricity charged at cost - We organise occasional events and trips - There is a weekly shopping trip - The small town of X is about 3km away and has a range of shops What you need to bring with you - ID. Proof of identity and if necessary proof of entitlement to work in the UK - Old clothes for work. These are likely to get very dirty and should be comfortable. - Boots or stout shoes - Enough money to last for at least 10 days until you are first paid - A WARM sleeping bag or duvet, although we can supply these at cost Covid-19 updates We will be following current government advice for the health and safety of everyone at the farm Work - Food production is classed as essential work and we therefore do not intend to shut down. Accommodation - Where accommodation is required we will spread people out as much as possible but it is likely you will need to share with at least one other person. - Movement restrictions may mean accommodation is not quite up to our normal standards but we will do the best we can until the situation changes. Hygiene - We will provide hand washing facilities and sanitiser. All workers will be expected to use them frequently and to keep a safe distance from other people. Shopping trips - Currently we will not be running these. We plan either to have supermarket deliveries to the farm, or if this is not possible, we will pre-order and send someone to collect. Trips and social events - Unfortunately these will not take place until the epidemic is over.' Out of interest I clicked on a Daily Mail article about it, and was surprised at its relative neutrality. Even couched in positive terms at some points, eg: 'The Romanians are joining the fight to save the UK's harvest with the British 'land army', which was created to prevent crops being left rotting in fields.' If anything their bile is reserved for UK workers not taking up the shortfall: 'With 450,000 new unemployment benefit claims lodged since the Covid-19 crisis began, the Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs put out an appeal for a home grown land army. So far around 32,000 have signed up for the scheme but only 4,000 have actually made themselves available for interview.' This is reflected in the comments, lots of which complain about 'work shy' brits, but surprisingly hardly any racist comments towards the Romanian workers themselves (though I only looked at the best rated comments). I liked this one, apparently left by a Slovakian in the know: 'LIEINGMSM, thegulf, Slovakia, about 3 hours ago So an eu subsidised, minimum wage payer can continue raking in profits. Nothing more. "land army". Are you having a laugh?' It's unclear whether the failure to find the 60,000-80,000 pickers is due to lack of UK applicants or admin failures in processing such a large volume. From the graun: 'The farming industry needs as many as 90,000 workers to harvest fruit and vegetables, but with borders closed in many countries it appealed to students and laid-off restaurant and hotel staff. Brighton-based Concordia, one of the biggest recruiters of volunteer workers in the country, said it had 35,000 applications of interest after the appeal. While the response was significant, it said only 16% – 5,500 people – opted to interview for a role, leaving a gap between supply and demand for pickers. In a sign of the impact of coronavirus on the economy, the company said “almost 90% of applicants [were] from UK citizens, half of whom have lost their livelihoods due to the Covid-19 outbreak”. It added only 30% had worked on a farm before.' - https://www.dumptheguardian.com/world/2020/apr/15/romanian-fruit-pickers-flown-uk-crisis-farming-sector-coronavirus Wouldn't take much for the workforce to get infected. Expect to see a panic about buying strawberries and raspberries handled by possibly infected workers later in the summer! Really shows the unsustainability of the global food system, with worker shortfall for farms in rich countries - even during a pandemic w/ mass unemployment! - and workers willing to risk their lives coming over from poor countries presumably cos there's still no suitable work for them over there. People will look back and shake their heads in disbelief... I |