Fruit and veg to run out if farms don't get pickers

[SudokuQueen]

www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/mar/28/fruit-and-veg-will-run-out-unless-britain-charters-planes-to-fly-in-farm-workers-from-eastern-europe

Why do we actually need to fly people in from other countries when there are a ton of people not working now due to corona killing off their jobs?

Unemployment has gone up by tens of thousands in a week. Just a week. It will only increase.

Food pickers are keyworkers so can go out to do this. Why can't we just get the new unemployed to do this? Yeah it might not be the amount of money you were getting before, but I bet its better than benefits.

That's a VERY angry group of people now after paying 9k to be massively fuck over this year.....

Who has fucked them over? The world?

Some students are appreciative of the extraordinary efforts their academics are making to get online teaching and examination up and running.

I've worked as a veg picker and packer from age 16 as a student. Also in various places packing fruit, veg, flowers and in nursery greenhouses, etc in east Anglia.
It was minimum wage back in the day circa 25years ago. But fair enough. The work isn't that hard if you're fit and healthy. It is rather mindless but its honest work. The farmers and employment services are greedy and awful to the workers. They assume you're hungover or lazy even if you are I'll. They have been happy to pay migrant workers less than minimum wage all these years causing a lot of resentment to locals who would want the work if it was a fair wage.
But its ludicrous they want to import workers when they should have been paying decent wages to start.

Errol that is a good idea! - and there may well be other university halls of residence near other sites. Or hotels as well, at least in the short term.

My understanding is that recruitment hasn't started in earnest because the work doesn't start just yet, so there could be time to organise this.

The more people who can find paid employment, the better.

@30daysoflight

Would if I had lost my job, but I'm a keyworker so one of the lucky ones.

"Not easy to practise social isolation in a double-decker bus."

Yes I think that's why the plan would be to have 14 days quarantine before starting work - although I do see that if you're living off-site (eg in halls of residence in a nearby town) you won't be in an enclosed community. Hmm. I feel there must be a solution - rapid building of temporary accommodation on or near the sites?

The workers who come over are willing to start at one end of the country and move around to where they’re needed as the harvest progresses.
They’re extremely efficient at what they do and it’s incredibly hard work, from sun up until sundown - you can be out in the fields with no shelter from either baking sunshine or pouring rain, or sweltering in a polytunnel. The window they have to get the harvest in is very narrow - you can’t just have 80,000 people turning up who’ve never done it before, they have to be able to work at peak efficiency from the first day.

Are you being serious?

I normally do some conservation volunteering (hacking brambles, balsam bashing etc). I work part time so if a local producer could use part time volunteers and I could work in appropriate isolation or DH and I had had CV by that point (hes 'risky' though not 'vulnerable') then I'd give it a go rather than leave food to rot.

If they paid a decent wage then they'd have no shortage of applicants. It might not be especially skilled work, but it's physically tough and the hours are long. The people doing it deserve to be paid fairly.

Of course, this would mean the price we pay for fruit and vegetables would have to go up. It's still the right thing to do.

@VladmirsPoutine

What's your solution then? We can't get immigrants to come and do the work for us. We will eventually run out if it's not done.

I don't know what the solution is other than that. Rations I guess?

Because Brits are too lazy and entitled.

We don't have the right to tell people who have lost their livelihoods during a pandemic to go and do tough, manual labour for little reward. Most people are trying to keep themselves and their families safe. The fantastic retail workers have already been taken for granted and been abused and worse. Are the unemployed worth less than the employed or the wealthy.

Some students are appreciative of the extraordinary efforts their academics are making to get online teaching and examination up and running.

Some academics. Unfortunately some academics don't. At all. Considering they just came back from strikes, it's just... "Yeah. Continue reading your book". Nvm. Some universities still haven't let anyone know how it actually will be. What assesments, if any. How. It's just a ridiculous situation for many. It is anger at unies rather than academics though.

Luckily, in good news, at least now some students are being released from their rentals in uni halls of residence. So yay. That actually means they could be used as pp suggested, which is good.

Expensive (or subsidised) fruit and veg or no fruit and veg.

Which would you prefer?

@30daysoflight

So it's telling them there's no food at all instead and they have to starve? That's not a good option either.

My niece has completed an application form for this as she was working part time in hospitality whilst at uni. So agree would be a great idea for students. Also agree that it should be offered to people on JSA and if they don’t take it stop their money. But yes perhaps keep half or even all the benefits whilst doing the work and getting paid on top.

It's bonkers, OP. I agree.

I worked as a fruit picker a few years ago. It was hard but I needed the money. So I did it.

If Romanians are able to pick apples, why aren't Brits? Because there is a large layer of the population who is entitled and work shy.

I don't think anyone is (yet) talking about conscription but there seem to be plenty of people going stir crazy who might rather do some physical labour than sit around.

Yeah jsa ontop or the government tops up their wages to make it over nmw. Go by the living wage or whatever they are calling it these days.

You expect people from this country to actually do some manual work like picking veg, and for wages below those they expect they are worth

Oh the naivety on this thread.

The british people as a whole are lazy, feckless and shit at picking fruit?

Or was it just easier for the farmers to employ and exploit many Eastern Europeon workers. Who would work for below minimum wage, often in shared accommodation being bussed from farm to farm.
No need to worry about those pesky workers rights for those guys!
As long as the masses still get cheap food.

I think many of the newly unemployed and students will be very keen to find paid employment, so, especially if they can travel, there may well be high take up of the jobs available. It will be interesting to see, once the recruitment effort starts.

The pickers can take some of the fruit and veg home with them in payment for their work ?
Those looking for work in the area can do it or have their money stopped ?
There are lots of options . I’ll do it if people are needed in my area . It’s manual labour , it won’t kill anyone .

I'm surprised there were no conditions attached to furloughed people getting up to £2,500 per month. It would have been easy to say yes you can get up to 80% pay but you have to volunteer to do 80% of your normal working hours at one of these approved jobs. The govt would know the priorities so it could be helping out in a care home, picking fruit and veg, shopping for the housebound or whatever was necessary. Obviously health conditions would need to be considered.