Sectors wrecked, workers exploited… the Brexit bonuses keep on coming

FLEX (Focus on Labour Exploitation) is a charity doing important work. Its latest report is on the UK’s migration system after the end of free movement within the EU and it makes for frightening reading.

Whole sectors of the British economy are failing because they no longer have access to the EU citizens who have traditionally done the jobs that UK citi zens are not able or willing to do. Among the hardest hit sectors are hospitality, care work and farming.

The previous government, caught between a rock of its own making and a hard place also of its own making, tried to bring down immigration while implementing Brexit. It replaced a perfectly workable free-market solution with costly red tape, visa fees, huge costs, plus increasingly high wage levels for skilled workers and a series of government-enforced quotas for everyone else.

The result has been a shortage of workers to fill vacant positions, which in many cases can lead to unpleasant after-effects for those still working in the sectors.

In the care sector, many small firms just cannot deal with the red tape. Asif Yusuf of Life in Care Friends told Flex’s researchers: “Lots of homecare providers are quite small. They are small community-based providers that might only work with maybe 15 or 20 families… So it’s just not worth their while jumping through all the bureaucracy and the hoops.”

One farmer FLEX spoke to was thoroughly pessimistic about what this all means for the future of their industry, saying: “The young farmers are not interested in continuing because there is no future. So, our industry will shrink and disappear. Maybe not disappear, but will be downsized significantly in the next few years. I’m quite sure about it.”

Meanwhile, foreign chefs are now too expensive to hire as they have to be paid as highly-skilled workers. The last government increased the minimum salary for these in another attempt to bring down the immigration figures.

According to Hospitality UK, this is devastating the restaurant sector. It told FLEX: “The salary threshold going up to £38,700… kills it, basically, I think for hospitality.”

As a result, foreign workers are increasingly being squeezed by desperate employers and ruthless bosses. FLEX is therefore calling for several measures to protect immigrant workers and make it easier and cheaper for them to be employed here, including cutting visa fees, enforcing pay and work conditions and broadening existing visa schemes.

Frankly, the new government needs to fix the Brexit mess. It is hampering growth, wrecking industries, forcing up costs and leading to foreign workers becoming stuck in exploitative work, with no way out.