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.

I don’t need to make suggestions. It is far more complicated that labour supply as many other posters on this thread have tried to explain.

Than labour supply

Well said outsider . Everyone wants someone else to sort this all out .

It would be beneficial if you could try Mrs G , instead of giving reasons why those not currently working should continue to not work .

@MrsGrindah

What else am I meant to call them? The jobless? Those on benefits? They are unemployed, it's not their fault and I never said it was? I've been unemployed before. Pretty sure everyone has. It's a shit situation that has caused it, that's obvious or so I thought?

And who else are we meant to use, doctors? Nurses? The police? The army? Where else do these workers come from? We can't bring them from other countries anymore. Why not those who are unemployed? It gives them a chance to work again until their original job is available. We can't magically make other people appear.

@Havanananana

You're right it will be the same in other countries so its not like we can rely on them providing us with food.

Beneficial to who?

Suduko Of course we can’t magic people up. But equally we can’t force people into jobs . They need to be fit, willing, live nearby , not likely to get higher paid work etc. Which won’t equate to tens of thousands.

@MrsGrindah as @Havanananana has pointed out they may get forced in the end. Would you rather starve than work in fields?

To be fair though if they don't have a solution for this soon, it won't matter, the choice will have been made for you.

Who were we expecting to do it post Brexit? Let’s get them to do the work starting a year early.

We would all pick fruit if it was starve or nothing. But you are talking about forcing people now, without explaining what that would entail. All I’m saying is we currently can’t “ get the unemployed” to do it.

Of course we can’t magic people up. But equally we can’t force people into jobs

If a State of Emergency is declared, then of course the government can both magic people up and force them into jobs. It is called conscription. It was essential in WW2 when prisoners, POWs and the Land Army were used to provide labour to the agriculture industry.

True but I believe that some posters on this thread are talking about getting people to do this now i.e under current circumstances.

But those circumstances are going to start happening soon. The food will start to rot soon. Plans need to be in place in advance to organise people to do the work, to get them there, provide accommodation if required, provide childcare for their children etc. These things can't happen overnight and the virus makes it harder to do. On top of all that you need to keep the workers safe with masks etc. A hospital near me is now begging people in the community for masks and equipment because they are getting nothing from the government. How are we going to provide for the pickers if we can't even provide for hospitals?

here you go, problem solved.

I wonder what he wants with these children?

And how does it get decided which lucky people get to do this job? I'd imagine that if you're not young and without health conditions it would be near enough impossible.
But thanks to those on this thread so eager to volunteer the services of those already reeling from getting financially fucked overnight.

Would asking certain categories of prisoners if they want to do it for MW plus the extra credit holding down a job would give them on release be a possibility?

@WeWantSweet

Oh I forgot about prisoners... That would be a good idea although not for a lesser sentence. And obviously not the violent ones. Can't really risk them getting loose.

And how does it get decided which lucky people get to do this job?

Conscription is more common than people in the UK might think. Many European countries still have some form of National Service, as did the UK until 1963, so it is easy enough to look at how it was handled previously. In some countries, the Corona crisis has already resulted in some groups of recent National Service personnel being re-mobilised - for example those who served in Medical Units.

During WW2 the UK government asked for volunteers to do paid work on the farms. When this didn't produce sufficient workers, they drafted in Prisoners of War. Finally, as there were still too few workers, people were conscripted.

People are particularly needed at harvest time, which for some soft fruits and vegetables is just weeks away.

[For the sake of clarity. I am not advocating this; merely pointing out that it is an option open to the government should things get so bad that a State of Emergency has to be declared - something which I am likewise neither proposing or predicting]

MAXNORMAL totally agree. I will volunteer to help anyone but will not agree with unemployed or lower income being thrown under the bus for others. Supermarkets already shaft producers for ugly produce and tonnes of food is already wasted because we don't like it. Did any of us really make this decision. Personally don't care what it looks like it is nutritious food. Potatoes, carrots, onions etc all tastes same. Do not ask others to do what you won't do yourselves. Leaving thread now but please don't pretend this is for the benefit of the unemployed.

I know someone who used employ local British pickers. They were a nightmare- they were continuously late, did the minimum amount of work, complained when it rained. The icing on the cake was when she caught some peeing in the fruit containers to make them heavier. From then she only employed Europeans. They came, worked hard and went home at the end of the season. They are good friends with some years later. I’m sure some of the brits worked hard and were good but the dodgy ones spoiled it for the many. The Europeans worked their butts off. Waiting for the backlash but this is true. There will be work out there picking, if people are prepared to put the effort in and actually work.

I would not expect anybody, the unemployed or students to put their lives on the line doing this unless antibody testing is available (and only those with them are employed), decent, hygienic accommodation is erected and meals provided, (in the vein of the new hospitals, prefabs?) and workers are set shifts of no more than 6 hours a day, as it is back breaking, with breaks and 2 days off a week at living wage rate.

Students should be targeted in the vein of ‘your country needs you’. My DS’s would do it to be other young people and I would be happy them to do it in that situation.

The government probably probably needs to commandeer farms, paying them a proportion of the profit so decent standards for production/workers are maintained? Overseen by the military perhaps? We are in a ‘war’ situation after all.

Let’s hope they are sorting this out as we speak. It’s pretty obvious there’s going to be a food supply issue as we import 50% of our food and other countries exports are going to be affected because they need food for for their own people and production will be down.

And DFO with your anti British sentiments. Natives of this country who have high rent and bills to pay all year long quite rightly don’t want to this kind of poorly paid for the effort, seasonal work in bad conditions where they’d have to go weeks without money waiting for a new benefit claim when the work ends and where they don’t have another country to go home to where the money they’d earn for a few months would be enough to build a house and last them all year .

Purpletigers do you live in Ireland? I thought that after Ireland joined the EU then tenant farms were allowed again.

Do you think this work would suitable for 16yos. My DS has had his exams cancelled, his football cancelled, all the festivals and partys he eas to go to cancelled. I think this would suit him (we are in Kent BTW).

350 -600 pounds a week fruit picking. Piece work so the more you pick the more you earn.

I really don’t think people have ever thought properly about where their food comes from and the work it takes to produce it.

I would have hoped in these unprecedented times the general public would be more appreciative of the farmers and farm workers who work such long hours to feed everyone. The supermarkets are the ones raking in the profits . You only have to research the mark up on food and the percentage a farmer receives in payment to see just how screwed the whole system is .
People will pay £1k for a damn phone but they complaint if they can’t buy their weekly shop for less than their monthly sky bill . Our priorities are skewed

This really. And the fact that many farmers pay rent to landowners further shafting them.

I agree many people don’t understand farming and the relationship with food supply.