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Seasonal Farm Worker Shortage



Herr Tubthumper

Well-known member
NSC Licker Extraordinaire
Jul 11, 2003
59,075
The Fatherland
Ah, Lincolnshire. One of the regions at the heart of the Brexit campaign. It's all working well for them by the looks of things. Next thing you know they'll be complaining about staff shortages in hospitals making them wait for their appointments.

And the fact they can't afford anything anymore due to EU free-trade being sacked off. I feel for the Remainers but If you voted for Brexit then tough shit, you have to live with the consequences.
 

ManOfSussex

We wunt be druv
Apr 11, 2016
14,729
Rape of Hastings, Sussex
Ah, Lincolnshire. One of the regions at the heart of the Brexit campaign. It's all working well for them by the looks of things. Next thing you know they'll be complaining about staff shortages in hospitals making them wait for their appointments.

Just like in Grantham. The hospital's A&E department is shut overnight because of just that.
 

Official Old Man

Uckfield Seagull
Aug 27, 2011
8,458
Brighton
Speaking here as someone who has been on both sides of this.
I worked in Spain and my wage was low, 12 hours a day, seven days a week.
Meanwhile here now I need 6 summer staff. British atitude is to turn up when they feel like it, go home early and never do any work when they are here. Foriegn staff turn up on time, work hard, ask for more hours and never let me down. All are on minimum wage plus bonus plus holiday pay.
Taking this past weekend as an example. Foriegn started at 9 am. British strolled in at 10:15 and sat down to eat breakfast.
British staff just don't want to work, end of.
 


wellquickwoody

Many More Voting Years
NSC Licker Extraordinaire
Aug 10, 2007
13,577
Melbourne
Is it me or is this whole thing somewhat unsavoury? You've got UK farms bemoaning their inability to attract migrant workers from Eastern Europe because of Brexit uncertainty and a weak pound, but surely there's an issue of slave wages being paid etc. I appreciate UK farming is 'on its knees' but to bemoan not being able to essentially 'exploit' cheap Albanian labour stinks somewhat, to me anyway.

You will be happy paying 20 per cent more for your fruit and veg then? Along with higher taxation, higher mortgage payments and more for just about everything else? If so, please continue.
 


CHAPPERS

DISCO SPENG
Jul 5, 2003
44,749
Hundreds of thousands of them will give up their unemployment benefit, and housing benefits for minimum wage back breaking work. Think he is onto something here.

Hundreds of thousands of them willl also be prepared to uproot their families and move away from their friends and support network for this seasonal work also I would guess.
 

ManOfSussex

We wunt be druv
Apr 11, 2016
14,729
Rape of Hastings, Sussex
Hundreds of thousands of them willl also be prepared to uproot their families and move away from their friends and support network for this seasonal work also I would guess.

Hundreds of thousands of them will also be prepared to live in very expensive places like Kent and also do this seasonal work for the minimum wage also I would guess.
 

BigGully

Well-known member
Sep 8, 2006
7,139
No idea. But I do believe if you can't pay a living wage you don't have a viable business. I'm not fan of farmers but I do think we should all be paying a lot more for farm produce.

Precisely, however whilst it might not be a viable wage for a British worker it is for an eastern European that can get a rate of pay up to five times more than he would for similar work back home, it is the EU that facilitates the skewed market that results in driving these wages down and sucking in workers from the poorest parts of the EU.

On the one hand you predictably sneer at those Brexiteers in Lincolnshire whilst then demanding farmers pay a living wage even though they have a glut of cheap labour coming to the UK on their EU ticket.
 


WATFORD zero

Well-known member
NSC Licker Extraordinaire
Jul 10, 2003
25,550
We have one a half million people unemployed and none of them can pull potatoes or cabbages out of the ground? ???

If only someone had thought of this a few months ago when all we were getting was those 'scare stories '
 

Trufflehound

Re-enfranchised
Aug 5, 2003
14,103
The democratic and free EU
28 replies and no one's mentioned the word 'supermarkets'?

Farms can't afford to pay workers high wages because the supermarkets are always leaning on them, forcing the prices down and squeezing the farmers' margins in order to safeguard their own. And many farmers know that the supermarkets control the food market, so without them the farms would quickly go out of business.

And one reason the supermarkets do that (besides paying shareholders' dividends) is that their customers are used to buying cheap food that is really below the real cost price in some cases.

If the UK farming industry is to be sustainable into the long term future, people are just going to have to get used to paying a realistic price for things. And the supermarket shareholders are going to have to become less greedy. Neither of those are particularly likely to happen.
 

BigGully

Well-known member
Sep 8, 2006
7,139
28 replies and no one's mentioned the word 'supermarkets'?

Farms can't afford to pay workers high wages because the supermarkets are always leaning on them, forcing the prices down and squeezing the farmers' margins in order to safeguard their own. And many farmers know that the supermarkets control the food market, so without them the farms wouls quickly go out of business.

And one reason the supermarkets do that (besides paying shareholders' dividends) is that their customers are used to buying cheap food that is really below the real cost price in some cases.

If the UK farming industry is to be sustainable into the long term future, people are just going to have to get used to paying a realistic price for things. And the supermarket shareholders are going to have to become less greedy. Neither of those are particularly likely to happen.

Agree to a point, but before supermarkets families were still going on 'holiday' to hop pick in Kent, even accepting farming can be labour intensive they seem to have a long history of using cheap labour.

At some point it would be nice to see a competitive wage where the supermarkets and us the consumer pay a sustainable price at the till, I cannot help thinking that for todays cheap punnet of strawberries, we soon get taxed to subsidise those very workers and those farmers producing the fruit anyway.
 


Publius Ovidius

Well-known member
Jul 5, 2003
45,896
at home
i always thought that members of the travelling community and students were the fruit pickers and vegetable harvesters...so much so that our school terms were designed around the availability of students and their parents to undertake this work through the summer months?

Are the travelling community above this sort of thing now, preferring to do odd jobs around the community they happen to be parked up on?
 

The Large One

Who's Next?
Jul 7, 2003
52,343
97.2FM
Precisely, however whilst it might not be a viable wage for a British worker it is for an eastern European that can get a rate of pay up to five times more than he would for similar work back home, it is the EU that facilitates the skewed market that results in driving these wages down and sucking in workers from the poorest parts of the EU.

On the one hand you predictably sneer at those Brexiteers in Lincolnshire whilst then demanding farmers pay a living wage even though they have a glut of cheap labour coming to the UK on their EU ticket.

The EU is not responsible for the level of wages and/or cost of living in differing emerging/new EU countries. Those countries who've joined in the past 10 years or so aren't just going to alter their salary structure to suit the UK. And the EU certainly isn't facilitating that.

A 10% rise in non-skilled EU workers coming to the UK would result in a 1.8% pay drop, according to the Bank of England (the equivalent of being paid £7.44 an hour as as opposed to £7.50 an hour) - which is vastly different from 'driving wages down'. Across ALL sectors of working migrants, there is no evidence of any wages being driven down.
 

jakarta

Well-known member
May 25, 2007
15,616
Sullington
Hundreds of thousands of them will give up their unemployment benefit, and housing benefits for minimum wage back breaking work. Think he is onto something here.

Presumably you think unemployment and housing benefits drop from the sky? Also presume you think 'Back breaking work' is only for Eastern Europeans?
 

daveinprague

New member
Oct 1, 2009
12,572
Prague, Czech Republic
Presumably you think unemployment and housing benefits drop from the sky? Also presume you think 'Back breaking work' is only for Eastern Europeans?

No, but I live in the real world, and not the sunlit uplands of Brexit fantasy.
I think an earlier poster made the point about migrant workers, and UK workers when it comes to this sort of work.
So, honestly, you think people will give up their benefits, and move their households to do this sort of work for miniumum wages? Really?
 


jakarta

Well-known member
May 25, 2007
15,616
Sullington
No, but I live in the real world, and not the sunlit uplands of Brexit fantasy.
I think an earlier poster made the point about migrant workers, and UK workers when it comes to this sort of work.
So, honestly, you think people will give up their benefits, and move their households to do this sort of work for miniumum wages? Really?

Yes I think they should be told their 'benefits' are paid for by taxpayers like me and if there is work available for them they get out there & do it. Really.
 

Westdene Seagull

aka Cap'n Carl Firecrotch
NSC Licker Extraordinaire
Oct 27, 2003
20,923
The arse end of Hangleton

We can all play that game though .....
French Field.jpg

Fruit Farm.jpg
 

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