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My brief flirtation with newcastle's local slave trade

  
  

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grim reader
19:33 / 27.06.03
I'm posting this in Switchboard because it seems the most suitable place, but if any moderators want to move it to Conversation or somewhere, feel free.

I really don't know where to start with this one; bear with me as i try to explain. My Fiance and I have been applying for quite a lot of jobs, one of which was strawberry picking. We got a call two nights ago (25th of June), at about 10 or 11pm, just as we were planning to get really shloshed on a few bottles of cheap plonk. The caller, (insert generic islamic name here), told us to be in newcastle city centre the next morning for 7am to catch a bus to the strawberry farm. We were told that we'd easily spot the bus, as there would be a load of chinese people waiting for it. I just assumed this meant that a load of chinese students had caught onto fruitpicking as a fairly good job, as they were advertising pay as between £25-30 a day, with picking finishing at 2pm. Oh, how naive i am. So, we got up dead early on the 26th and got on this bus, which started taking us out of the city via Fenham, a really poor part of the city where the asylum seekers seem to get dumped. There, there were another couple of buses which were soon filled with lots of wogs and other assorted foreigners, and off we went to the farm. We were the only white people being taken to the farm, and I'm not sure how (generic islamic name) made the mistake of getting us a seat on the bus. I can't help thinking he is either a genius or an idiot for inviting two people living in Jesmond (posh bastard area of the city) along to a job for exploited immigrant labour.

Anyway, got to the farm, and the pickers were divided into two groups. We were put into a group with a mix of west africans, a handful of islamic ladies, and a few other asians. There were also a handful of local kids who were obviously there for a bit of pocket money and at least three of them were below the 16 year old limit the farm had advertised. A local lad about my age (19-21ish) had the job of 'supervisor'. We went to work on the first field, and each worker was given a piece of card where you had to write your name, and for each tray of fruit you picked (9 punnits per tray) you got a hole punched in the card by the supervisor. Myself and Becky picked about 5 trays worth between us in the first field, and the supervising lad sorted through them, removing any that weren't up to his high standards. He was saying the strawberries were destined for Safeways, and that the strawberries had to look nice otherwise nobody would buy them Fair enough, I thought, as only a handful of the ones I'd picked were rejected and at least i had an idea of what he wanted us to pick.(I don't know if the farm was selling to Safeways, thats just what this guy was saying. I'd really love to find out just where they were being sold to). When we moved to the second field, Becky and I must have picked maybe three or four trays; we brought them to the supervisor, he picked out a handful, said they weren't good enough, and sent us off to sort through them. There was loads of really good fruit which they were saying wasn't acceptable, which they were throwing into a spare tray. I didn't really watch what happened to this tray, but did notice that it kept vanishing; they were taking away these trays of 'rejected fruit' along with the fruit acceptable for the consumer's eye, but refusing to acknowledge the people who picked them as worthy of payment. It was pretty obvious that they didn't want a couple of white people who they couldn't exploit working there, and were doing their best to piss us off. He kept picking up perfectly good fruit, sticking his finger into it, and saying 'thats too soft', and chucking it. 'Would you buy that?' he kept asking, and the immigrants just shook their heads, got on with it; most of them were pretending they couldn't understand english, and I'm sure a few of them genuinely couldn't. The local lads were being openly racist when the workers weren't in earshot, and the way they spoke to them when they were was incredibly bad; the black west african guys were in for it worst. The women tended to just be patronised, but behind their backs they were coming out with some stuff that crossed the line from lads-being-lads into plain old mysogyny. I was telling someone about this later that day, and they were astounded at a bunch of western kids telling a load of immigrants that the food was unsuitable. As was pointed out to me, these people come from places where you eat everything and nothing gets thrown away.

Eventually, after hearing 'would you buy that' for what must have been the hundredth time, i told him 'no, because strawberries are a luxury product, and i can't afford them'. He started saying 'i'm getting me ass whupped from me boss, safeways are complaining about the strawberries' etc etc. He started going on about how all the fruit we were picking was shit 'and i can't accept shit, i get in trouble for it.' At this point, I asked him where i could get paid, and told him I'd fuck of home as soon as they gave me my money. Another local guy, this time in his 40's and plastered with tattoos, was hanging around at this point (this was the guy driving the trailer and picking up the strawberries). He told me I couldn't go anywhere, and that we wouldn't get paid till the end of the day. We decided to hang around so we could get the bus back into newcastle, but there was a kind of veiled threat in the 'you can't leave' thing; i'm not sure if they would have stopped us leaving, but if we'd been immigrants i've no doubt they would have tried. This argument happened about 12ish, and we'd been working since just before 8am, and had a couple of hours till everyone was sent back in the bus, so spent the rest of the day sitting in the sun ('twas glorious weather), getting burnt and observing how the immigrants were getting treated. The immigrants had been avoiding Becky and me all day, but were even more wary of us now we'd argued with the bosses; it was pretty clear that they daren't say a word because they needed the money, and would be out of a job if they complained. I couldn't help thinking of the cabbage pickers' union episode of the A-Team, where they built a cabbage cannon to beat the exploitative farm owners, and wondered how well a strawberry shotgun might work.

When the picking was finished, the local lads noticed there were a load of strawberries just lying in the grass; these were the ones I'd been sorting through, and I'd just tossed them on the grass since they were so 'unsuitable' (don't worry, i did eat plenty and Becky filled her rucksack, too. Technically, I suppose it's theft, but i think i've got a better case against them). They started grilling the islamic women about who had thrown these strawberries on the grass, and they just feigned that they didn't speak english, and began picking them up; the lads started saying 'just point them out, you won't get in trouble', and i was just getting ready to jump up when they decided to let it go. If someone had been pointed out, I'm sure they'd have been told not to come back or had the little pay they got reduced. So, even the rejected fruit was definitely being taken away to be sold.

The mechanics of payment were something else; first you had to take your card with the hole punches into this little green hut, where the supervisor and one of the other local lads signed it. Then you had to take it to a blue van with two people sitting in the front, and hand your card in one side, and walk around to the other side to get your cash. Becky got £2.40 and I got £5.10, and apparently they took off £3 for the bus journey, too. That princely sum of £7.50 represented the pay of two people picking fruit for about four hours. The others were going away with around £10 each, even the seasoned pickers, and they'd been working for about five or six hours that day.

Epilogue: We got on the bus, and noticed all the rich white people in the 'pick-your-own' section of the farm, nicely screened from the immigrant labourers. The driver was listening to Wimbledon on the radio. We ended up in the city centre for about 3pm, and wandered about absolutely astounded at what had just happened to us. We went to a bar, got a nice cold beer each with our earnings, and waited for it all to sink in as all these people who had spent the day shopping walked by with their huge bags with huge logos. There was also some mad bitch dragging her son along by a leash tied round his wrist, whilst talking into her mobile phone. I know it's irrelevant, but it pissed me off.

Anyway, the reason I post this here was that I had resolved to write about this experience and let other people know about it; i would have posted this on my blog, but i think it deserves a wider audience. I've not mentioned the name of the farm, because I don't want any of the immigrants to be out of a job because of what i write; it was obvious these people desperately needed that money just from the amount of shit they tolerated from the wankers in charge. I'd be very interested in hearing other people's views on this, and suggestions about what, if anything, might be done.

Just as a final note, i mentioned my day to an Iranian friend who i went to school with when i caught him on MSN last night. It turns out he did some similar work when he first came to Britain, and wasn't really suprised at what I told him; he was more suprised, i think, that myself and Becky had ended up in the job. He asked me why we took it, thought maybe we were curious about immigrant labour conditions. I hope to talk to him more about it, and to others who know about similar stuff. Oh, and also, (generic islamic name) rang again last night asking me if I was coming back the next day. All I could do was politely explain my reasons for not coming back, and by the end of my reasoning, there was just this 'goodness gracious me' style '...oh, yes...oh, yes...'. Thanks for reading, hope this didn't bore you,

the dodds

(...i can see strawberries when i close my eyes...)
 
 
Linus Dunce
20:39 / 27.06.03
lots of wogs and other assorted foreigners

Do you think commonplace use of language like this maybe has some bearing on the way those people were treated?
 
 
Nematode
20:42 / 27.06.03
'wogs'.......right?
 
 
grim reader
22:09 / 27.06.03
Excuse me for using these terms in jest, no offence intended; i usually use these terms for the shock effect it has on the politically correct. You can call a spade a you-know-what, but what bothers me is how these people were treated, some of which did involve pretty nasty name calling, but i think it is the intent that one should examine; the language itself is just a carrier. It is very easy to replace offending language with PC words which hide the racism but still carry the same racist intent. I'm sorry if this has offended anyone; i intended to get straight to the point and cut the bullshit.

Last time i checked the media on asylum seekers (which, admittedly, was some time ago), it was getting lost up its own arse talking about whether or not calling them 'bogus' is acceptable. While people are talking about talking, these brown men, women and children are being shipped out of our country to be executed back home. Meanwhile, others are being exploited by farmers in this country. To me, this is a bigger deal than whether i use the terms raghead, wog, nigger, etc, none of which i've ever used to slap said brown people down. I've been subjected to a fair bit of abuse myself in the past, and it isn't worth getting wound up by the language when you should be trying to understand the attitude.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
09:21 / 28.06.03
Well, I am a bit uncomfortable with the random or attention-seeking use of the terms, which suggests I must be a devotee of political correctness... but sadly I have no idea what this means. Could anyone furnish me with a brief history of the movement - its origins, when it declared itself, any guidebooks or manifestos it might have, recognised leaders of the political correctness movement and any web sites they may have set up to explain their beliefs, that sort of thing?

Cheers.
 
 
Linus Dunce
12:28 / 28.06.03
It is very easy to replace offending language with PC words which hide the racism but still carry the same racist intent.

Yes, I agree with you there in principle. Unfortunately, you used another (re-)appropriated term, "PC," which has made your point difficult to argue because, as illustrated in Haus' tease, it refers to a fiction. Like "nigger" refers to a fiction.

However, at the end of the day, you did something other than the action you subsequently tried to justify. You could have used any number of words to describe the people to whom you originally referred, yet you chose "wogs." As race was obviously the issue, you could have used, say, "asian" or "afro-carribean." What would have been "PC" about that?

As for "shocking" people into paying attention, I think your story would have spoken for itself. The sad thing is, a lot of the world has to live like your one-time colleagues, all day, every day, until they become too sick or old to turn up for work. And then they die.

What I'm saying is, lose some of the baggage, spoon off some of the fat. You're right, swapping phonemes will do little to change the world. But it's not an "either/or" world. Choosing your language more carefully will mean more people will listen to you.
 
 
SMS
15:27 / 28.06.03
I'm interested in the subject of modern-day slavery, because I would like to see if I can get my church involved in helping some abolishonist movements. Apparently, slavery still exists in just about every country in the world.

I'm not certain this strawberry-picking counts as slavery, since the workers seemed to be free to go looking for another job, but I would encourage you to look into abolishonist movements (probably those who don't buy slaves into freedom, since this is counter-productive).

As far as the PC stuff goes, my initial response was judgmental: calvinballronan is right and other 'lithers are wrongly attacking him at the expense of the point, which is the poor working conditions of the fruit pickers. I apologize for this response. I'm trying to do this less often. (I'm telling you about it as a confession. I don't mean it as a backhanded way of doing it without admitting it).

I do think that demanding PC language tends to divide people into two camps. Those that will say "wog" are on our side; those that won't are on their side. Those that will say "fuck" are on ours; those that find it offensive on their side. It's like wearing a uniform, and it is a common and (possibly) necessary technique in affecting change. This is part of the reason American hippies wore outrageous outfits, used drugs, swore, etc.
 
 
Linus Dunce
16:38 / 28.06.03
No one's demanding "PC" language, whatever that is. I can't speak for Haus or Nematode, but I just think "wog" is inappropriate and unnecessary in most contexts, including this one. It's a perjorative term to which there are plenty of functional and established alternatives and not just "people of colour" or whatever it is you have in mind.

Well, perhaps it is appropriate in a discussion about race and quality of work-life. Which hopefully this discussion will be. To this end, here's my shot -- the fruit-pickers (and chicken-dressers and whatever) are free to leave ... to work where? And is that de facto slavery? Or is it more that they possibly could work somewhere else, but they're from a background where picking strawberries for pin money would be quite a cushy number so they don't mind doing it? Or is it, say, farmers and employment agencies whose market is so depressed by supermarket prices that they are encouraged to exploit people in this way -- after all, they're only "wogs," who's going to give a shit?
 
 
grim reader
17:56 / 28.06.03
Your original comment was Do you think commonplace use of language like this maybe has some bearing on the way those people were treated? and my answer is 'no'. I'm sure it has some relation to it, but i don't think those people ended up in the slave trade because some people happen to be a little cavalier in their choice of language now and then. Racism, and any other abuse, is about power inequalities rather than the words; the words are just tools of control. I mean, in the deep south, the word 'boy' became part of the racist lexicon. Do we all avoid using it now? Or do we begin to play with these words and totally change the way they're used and the connotations they carry? The word 'Christian' was originally a term of abuse against an oppressed group within the Roman Empire.

I wanted this thread to focus on the issue of slavery in british cities, and suggest opening another thread on the PC thing and 'how to correctly label exploited brown people' thing. Not that it's going to matter me for another 3 months, anyhoo, as i've just got a pretty good job in Grasmere, which means i'll be disconnected till september, but i started this thread and i think it's gone off topic, albeit in an interesting direction.

as for Choosing your language more carefully will mean more people will listen to you, i'm kind of more interested in talking to the people who can see the ideas and points behind the language and not get to fussed about the signal used to carry the message.

after all, they're only "wogs," who's going to give a shit? Well, I gave a shit, otherwise i wouldn't have bothered writing a huge post about it; wogs are people too, and the word 'wog' will only blind the terminally stupid to that fact (and i'm not accusing you of being terminally stupid, i think the points you've raised show you're obviously concerned about these people's wellbeing too).

Anyway, hope to chat more on this stuff once I'm back home. Hope you all have a good summer. All the best.

dodds
 
 
Linus Dunce
18:17 / 28.06.03
But "boy" has fair uses, "wog" doesn't. Not round here (IRL), anyway. So it's not the same.

I liked your post a lot, it was just the "wog" thing. Have a good summer too.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
19:49 / 28.06.03
Ronan, could you answer my question, please? I'm fascinated to hear more about this PC movement. Have they taken any action against you for your bold use of racially abusive terms? If not, is there a head office that we should contact?
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
22:30 / 28.06.03
Otherwise, we have a discussion of racial terminologies here, and one which touches on why clever people who have gone to college and everything cannot be racist here. One of the interesting findings of the first thread cited is, astonishingly, the people who are frequently less than happy with terms like "wog" are often the people who regularly encounter them as racial epithets describing themselves. Including, in fact, one much-admired and much-missed member of Barbelith who started a thread about her feelings at having been thus addressed (negative, generally). I'm generally of the mind that the desire of people on Barbelith and in general not to come across terms that they find generally directed at them with the intent to communicate racial hatred is probably more compelling than the desire of middle-class white people to feel iconoclastic.
 
 
Cherry Bomb
11:37 / 29.06.03
Why not expand this topic to include not just your experience, ronan, but also the hows and whys and of how such wage slavery happens and why it continues? Newcastle's strawberry picking industry is not the only place where workers are exploited - heck, I remember detassling corn when I was 14 and having a similar experience (though I stuck it out, stupidly, for 10 days and made $270, which seemed like a fortune at the time...)


This brings to mine Barbarba Ehrhenriech's Nickel & Dimed, and the more recent (seemingly copycat) "work" by Polly Toynbee.

Perhaps we can expand this topic?
 
 
Nematode
20:55 / 29.06.03
I liked your post. I've ssen the edges of this sort of scene. I worked for a while for a particularly exploitative pharmacuticals company that was using a lot of Indian workers on all sorts of highly dubious ways including one poor guy who was allowed to work with steroids without protective gear and was experiencing severe physiological effects and was unaware of the reason why. I can see the point of your use of the term 'wogs' but I'm afraid that I still find your use inelegant: provocation without anything to sustain it that simply left me unsure as to your motivation.
 
 
passer
01:30 / 30.06.03
I question the relevance of race. Exploitive labor practices take advantage of ignorance, poverty, and in many cases desperation/hope irregardless of race. Why is it that the immigrants are being exploited, but the local kids are not? Same work, same pay, same conditions. Is it just the slurs and condescension that make the situation exploitive or am I missing something?

(Side bar: It seems I'm a little behind on my British pejoratives, what exactly does wog mean? What’s the etymology?)
 
 
SMS
04:29 / 30.06.03
from m-w.com:

One entry found for wog.
Main Entry: wog
Pronunciation: 'wäg, 'wog
Function: noun
Etymology: perhaps short for golliwog
Date: circa 1929
chiefly British, usually disparaging : a dark-skinned foreigner; especially : one from the Middle East or Far East
 
 
William Sack
11:57 / 30.06.03
I question the relevance of race. Exploitive labor practices take advantage of ignorance, poverty, and in many cases desperation/hope irregardless of race. Why is it that the immigrants are being exploited, but the local kids are not?

Passer, I can think of a few reasons why race and (I'll add) nationality are highly relevant in an indirect way, certainly in the UK and, I would imagine, elsewhere. Calvinballronan's fellow pickers were all, so far as s/he could tell, non-British born, and I believe that this was no coincidence. As you rightly say, exploitative labour practices take advantage of ignorance, poverty, and desperation (if you clarify 'ignorance' to include, amongst other things, language difficulties, lack of access to support networks promoting your interests and informing you of rights and entitlements, and the simple fact of being in an unfamiliar community with the difficulties this often entails.)

In the UK at least, the law relating to benefit (Welfare) for asylum seekers is in a state of flux and many asylum seekers are not aware of their rights, often through the sort of 'ignorance' outlined above. Additionally there can be a 'keep your head down' attitude among some asylum seekers, often stemming from a perceived risk of deportation, which means that many are unwilling even to try to claim benefit in the first place, and once in a shitty job, to assert their rights when it comes to things like wages or discrimination.

So, yes, an unscrupulous employer is looking to exploit the poor, the ignorant, and the desperate and those less likely to complain or assert their rights. A non-British born asylum seeker often fits the bill perfectly. Race and nationality are not the only factors, sure, (as Cherry Bomb says, children also do some crappy work for little reward) but they are factors nonetheless.
 
 
pomegranate
17:14 / 30.06.03
I'm generally of the mind that the desire of people on Barbelith and in general not to come across terms that they find generally directed at them with the intent to communicate racial hatred is probably more compelling than the desire of middle-class white people to feel iconoclastic.

beautiful. i'm going to steal this but rephrase it so it's not just 'the desire of people on barbelith', but everywhere. thank you.

nickel and dimed is a great book. everyone should read it; i especially wish that rich republicans would read it.
 
 
passer
17:28 / 30.06.03
H.I.R. I agree that nationality is important, since immigrant labor is often the easiest to exploit. However, nationality is not race.
 
 
The_T
08:44 / 10.07.03
This is my first post to Barbelith so you'll have to forgive me if I break any rules of decorum. I Can't help feeling that though Ronan's use of the word was Inadvisable and doubtless needlessly offesnive that in the ensuing argument the orginal point has been lost. In a thread started about the use of illegal workers most posts are about the use of casual racism perhaps this would have been a more appopriate topic for a new thread. On the original subject, from what I have gleaned from various investigative reports across the news media, the use of asylum seekers and illegal immigrants is wurprisingly widespread across the entirety of the agricultural market qwith estimates made of up to 50% of casual labour being done by immigrants working illegally in shocking conditions on appalling wages for gangmasters who often double as people traffickers - with the illegal field work being mainly done as indebted servitude to pay back smuggler's fees. Sadly the produce almost crtainly will have gone to a supermarket. as like the rest of the agricultural market much of the produce in supermrkets marked made in the U.K. has been picked by immigrant workers. AS the film "Dirty pretty things" touched on, those claiming asylum in the U.K. are not allowed to qwork and will be deproted for doing so. This means that they can nevre complain about their employers no matter how shocking conditions become since it could result in the deportation of them and all their fellow workers. The local workers referred to are likewise being exploited since they do were by the sound of it too young to be working legally. All in all a sorry situation.
 
 
No star here laces
12:18 / 10.07.03
I opened this thread thinking it had an interesting title. Started reading the story, which I thought was fascinating, and generally well written. Then I got to the 'wogs' bit and thought "shame, given the nature of barbelith no-one will talk about the interesting stuff, instead they'll feel the need to recycle the whole fucking PC thing again just to score some points off each other."

Why don't we have a general-purpose sniping-at-people's-use-of-language thread in the conversation so that the minority who are interested in recycling this same debate, slinging the same insults and bringing up the same tedious comparisons can do so to their hearts contents.?

I don't think it's political-correctness-gone-mad, I just think it's fucking boring, aight?
 
 
Kit-Cat Club
13:07 / 10.07.03
[threadrot]

Actually that's a really good idea. You'd need to link to it from the offending thread though, otherwise the point might be missed. I'll start a Policy thread later.

[/threadrot]
 
 
Not Here Still
17:31 / 10.07.03
I third that Shoelace motion - yes, the word 'wogs' might well be very dodgy, but threadrot has fucked what could have been an interesting debate.

I'm certainly interested in the whole subject, especially given recent incidents in Wrexham, although those involved in the riots were refugees (and there's a whole other explosive thread in the riots, I think. Don't know if I can be bothered to start it as I can just see it descending into the usual mud-slinging, and I'm fucking sick of seeing that)

As someone points out, asylum seekers are not allowed to work until they are granted refugee status - something which, among other things, fuels resentment among people who claim they are just 'taking our taxes.'

This also leaves them (even more) vulnerable to exploitation, which leads to situations like this.

What is the reasoning behind the 'not working' rule? Can anyone point me to something about it online?
 
 
SMS
04:42 / 11.07.03
I would assume that the rule is meant to discourage those from enterring the country illegally who are not qualified to meet refugee status. It is a proceedural measure that is probably effective, but can cause undue suffering to actual refugees who are tied up with red tape.
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
23:04 / 11.07.03
And the moral of the story? When blowing the whistle on casual racism, try to avoid casual racism. Next week, rocket science.

One of the interesting and perpetuated ideas is that there is a direct connection between immigration to a country and the legislation of that country. Put another way, how many potential economic migrants/asylum seekers/bogus asylum seekers/insert terminology here check the legislation before departing? There seems to be an easy belief that everyone will check the Guardian website before venturing off to foreign climes...
 
 
Not Here Still
14:46 / 12.07.03
So the best we can come up with for the 'not working' law is that it is there to discourage people who entered the country illegally from not working.

Is it just me who sees the flaw in that?

And anyway, as Haus notes, how many people check the legislation before departing?

I can see it now: 'Hmmm, once I finish having chillis rubbed on my genitals, electric shocks applied to my body and irons placed on my skin for my political beliefs, I simply must have a check of the British government's legislation on asylum seeking before fleeing for my life...'
 
 
rizla mission
10:38 / 13.07.03
(just like to say that, having previously missed this thread and just stumbled upon it, Shoelace's above post is exactly what I was planning to say - so thanks for saving me the bother!)

But back to the topic in hand;

This whole sweatshop agricultural labour thing has been at the back of my mind for a while in terms of some heinously grim business which you know (from hearing other stories similar to calvin's) is going down probably not-a-million-miles from where you're sitting, and which is likely extremely widespread in the UK.. everyone must be kind of aware of it on some level, yet it's so seemingly invisible, it's the kind of ugly thing that's very easy to not think about..

Something else that bothers me about the current "immigrant siuation" (for want of a term less compatible with fuming bigotry) in Britain:
clearly the life situation of these people is intolerably shitty in comparison with the general population of the country, yet there seem to be worryingly few charity initiatives aimed at improving matters - to an outside observer of British society at the moment it could seem like there's no active counter to the fear & racism of the tabloids..

Thirdly: this adds considerably to my increasing grudge against supermarkets - I suppose it's kind of inevitable that this slave labour produced fruit should end up there, but I'd always somehow assumed that, y'know, despite being profit motivated bastard corporations, the supermarkets would steer clear of dubious rackets like this one in order to avoid getting bad press (& possible criminal proceedings?) if the whistle's ever blown.. a bit of a dumb assumption I suppose given the economics and likely outcomes of the situation..

If only there was a decent alternative to supermarkets - I'd stop buying from them in, like, a second. They do a lot of things I'm somewhat suspicious of..
but what else is there? I don't relish the thought of trying to piece together a varied and affordable diet from scattered family butchers, health food places and corner shops..
a problem certainly worth a thought or two..
 
 
ONLY NICE THINGS
12:08 / 13.07.03
I don't relish the thought of trying to piece together a varied and affordable diet from scattered family butchers, health food places and corner shops..

Well, that's a choice you have to make. Identifying and working around shops without ethical purchasing strategies takes up time and effort, and often costs more also. The question is whether you're prepared to do that/ able to do that in order to deprive traders whose methods you disapprove of of your trade. It's a more elaborate version of the fairtrade coffee issue.

Supermarkets would probably say that they have an obligation to their consumers to keep down the price, and so will buy from the most competitively-priced suppliers, and if those suppliers are shown to be using illegal methods to keep their own overheads down, they will stop using them, but they are unlikely to ask too closely.

Problem the second being that there are both legal and illegal fruit-picking gangmasters, just as there are legal and illegal building gang organisers. The legal ones have better contacts and bettr paperwork, the illegal ones lower overheads and *different* contacts, and are indeed more likely to go for workers less likely to complain about their exploitation because on dodgy legal ground already... whereas, for example, fruit-picking gangs in Kent may be made made up, or were when I was a young 'un, of students on their summer holidays earning a bit of cash.

Problem the third being that, just as unemployment is required to keep a check on inflation, the way our society is currently structured depends on cheap labour bewing available; illegal imnmigrants and the low-waged should be celebrated for their heroic efforts to keep the wheels on the economic model for very little reward, so that people at the other end can look at supermarket produce, decide that it is too expensive and inconvenient to go for locally farmed produce and stick it in their baskets... a difficulty and inconvenience which is of course encouraged by the supermarkets as a good business model.
 
 
alas
19:55 / 14.07.03
illegal imnmigrants and the low-waged should be celebrated for their heroic efforts to keep the wheels on the economic model for very little reward....

. . . but instead these new immigrants are reviled as a "drain" on our economies, and called nasty names to boot.

I was interested in the way that the supervisor in the story used the "I'll get in trouble" mantra--playing on the sympathies of the two workers--to justify his actions. It was a confusing moment--to what degree was he, in fact, telling the truth? to what degree was he manipulating the white workers into quitting?

Is it most ethical to not report this company? What do Barbelithers think--I'm not convinced it's right not to try to take some legal/whistleblowing action against this company. Thoughts?

Finally, I'm also interested in the seemingly just argument that's often raised in such context: immigrants do work that non-immigrants would not be willing to do. My take: Partly, that's only true because the work conditions in immigrant-dominated jobs are allowed to be worse than they have to be, because only immigrants are expected to do them. In other words, if companies wanted "legitimate" workers to be recruited as the primary workers, they could do so, but they would then also have to make more of a concerted effort to make the work more palatable--provide regular work breaks, meet minimal safety standards, etc., not to mention paying a living wage.

So there's something circular in that argument, even though I agree with the underlying sentiment that non-immigrants, particularly of the middle classes, depend on immigrants to do a lot of dirty work that we ourselves choose not to do.
 
 
Pingle!Pop
13:46 / 15.07.03
Perhaps these are the fully-qualified immigrant brain surgeons the Rt Hon Ann Widdecombe MP has so kindly pointed out are *living off the system* illegally picking strawberries. ****ing parasites. "Just trying to make a fast buck"... tell it like it is, sister.

Does anyone have a full transcript of that interview (Big Issue a couple of years back) anywhere?

What, does anyone know, would be the implications on alerting relevant authorities on matters such as the one above? I'd like to think the government would welcome all the w*rkers there with legal recognition and a guarantee of some decent level of living conditions, but wouldn't be so surprised if the official line on it were to be, "You ****** scroungers - off on the next ship with you. Back to Russia!"
 
 
The_T
23:40 / 29.07.03
It's good to see this discussion veering back towards it's original point. In reply to passim about reporting this I imagine the response will be as Pingles put it so eloquently "Back to Russia!" and that it would be very hard in any case to isolate and actually convict the people responsible, let alone getting any kind of actual justice for those exploited who needed the money and really didn't need to be deported. Sadly until a more progressive and less stupid bunch of people end up in power (probably never) there is very little that can be done about it.
 
 
grim reader
19:56 / 04.08.03
Hi All
re: alerting authorities, i thought about it but i don't want to alert them for several reasons. First, aye, it'll be back to Russia, or wherever the wogs(oops!) in question came from, which in many cases will leave them in crippling poverty, maybe even torture or execution. At the very least, it will leave them without their source of income; as low as their wages are, they obviously need the money, and they obviously didn't want my help or interference back when I was actually on the farm.
Secondly, the authorities may well be quite aware of this stuff already. I mean, there was no attempt to try and keep it from myself or my fiance, and it was pretty obvious we weren't immigrants like the others and they knew we were from a fairly wealthy area. I'm not sure the authorities would want to upset what is obviously a very neat little business venture.

Anyone got any other ideas of what might be done about this sort of exploitation?
 
 
SMS
04:45 / 05.08.03
You could start a business that employs these workers under better conditions, certainly helping those you employ and potentially forcing better conditions for the other workers as they start leaving the farm.

I know that's a bit of a big commitment to make, but I doubt anything less than a big commitment would be very effective. I imagine that some kind of not-for-profit organization could be formed to work on this kind of thing just from the market side, which is always a better solution where possible.
 
 
danielj
11:47 / 05.08.03
CASUALISED IMMIGRANT LABOUR IN BRITAIN:
FIRST-HAND INFORMATION SOUGHT BY VARIANT MAGAZINE
Variant magazine is looking into running a piece on the topic of forced / cheap immigrant labour in the UK and the British companies who make a profit from it. If anyone has information or contacts to offer please post them here or email me on cheaplabour@btopenworld.com.
Thanks
dj
 
 
Not Here Still
15:20 / 10.08.03
Opb SMaththewStolte: You could start a business that employs these workers under better conditions, certainly helping those you employ and potentially forcing better conditions for the other workers as they start leaving the farm.


Quick point; this business would, of course, be breaking the law as well. Doesn't matter that its intentions are good.

I'd suggest one of two outcomes is most likely; (1) the 'ethical' business is reported to the authorities, and is busted; (2) the ethical business is not reported to the authorities, but as with most people who cut in on organised crime, a couple of men in bomber jackets pop round for a 'chat' involving baseball bats and broken limbs.
 
  

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