Why won’t Brits pick vegetables for £30 an hour?

Hilly

Member
My dentist is Romanian. He was here before BREXIT and he is still here after BREXIT. He is doing further training at a university hospital here as he can’t get that level of training in Romania.
The educational establishments of this country train thousands of foreign students every year. Where they decide to work is up to them.
I don’t entirely agree that immigrants went back because of BREXIT. It was covid that shutdown flights and an improving economic situation back home that kept them away.
I’ll also add that the biggest theft in history of lead from church roofs in this region was by an itinerant gang of Lithuanians who had every right to “work” and settle here before Brexit. IMO it’s no bad thing at all that we can now “manage” immigration from the EU rather than it being a free for all where criminal gangs came in under the cover EU free movement rules.
Things will sort themselves out once the dust settles.
Hindered percent agree ! Well said.
 

glasshouse

Member
Location
lothians
Cornwall has low frost risk because of sea insulation, post war lots of farmers grew winter brassicas that would fill the gap in frost season south east England, these brassicas would be shipped to markets and collection centres, the farmers would have their own small gangs of UK cutters and packers

Around 20 years ago the supermarkets decided to contract all their produce to 3 growers, David Simmons in the article being one of them, the only reason they could scale their businesses up to the size required was cheap foreign labour, all the local cutters and packers disappeared into other jobs

I was in the Crossroads motel with 235 Cornish brassica growers in 1999 for a meeting when the price crashed because of no market for it, now you could get all the growers around a table in the pub, with more grown than before
There was a chap from cornwall played for my rugby team back then, we got thr full story about that. It was terrible.
 

farmerm

Member
Location
Shropshire
My dentist is Romanian. He was here before BREXIT and he is still here after BREXIT. He is doing further training at a university hospital here as he can’t get that level of training in Romania.
The educational establishments of this country train thousands of foreign students every year. Where they decide to work is up to them.
I don’t entirely agree that immigrants went back because of BREXIT. It was covid that shutdown flights and an improving economic situation back home that kept them away.
I’ll also add that the biggest theft in history of lead from church roofs in this region was by an itinerant gang of Lithuanians who had every right to “work” and settle here before Brexit. IMO it’s no bad thing at all that we can now “manage” immigration from the EU rather than it being a free for all where criminal gangs came in under the cover EU free movement rules.
Things will sort themselves out once the dust settles.
Your Dentist (and mine) is a migrant worker with settled status not a seasonal migrant worker who lives in Romania but comes to earn money for a time in the UK. Whilst the government can now "manage" immigration from the EU it seems they are choosing to limit such immigration only to those who can fill holes in sectors the government are the employers of ie the NHS
 

glasshouse

Member
Location
lothians
The EU was a gift to corporate agricultural businesses and the death of local production by small family farms, in the way it subsidised the biggest most, and undercut local labour with free movement of temporary slave labour from abroad. But hey ho, it seems that many want it
Including the ability to pass an English language test set at a doctor level ?
They have to talk to the cabbages in english
 

primmiemoo

Member
Location
Devon
The EU was a gift to corporate agricultural businesses and the death of local production by small family farms, in the way it subsidised the biggest most, and undercut local labour with free movement of temporary slave labour from abroad. But hey ho, it seems that many want it back.

HM's Govt's interpretation of EU thinking encouraged corporate ag. By and large, in the wider EU, governments used their individual sovereignty to look after their smaller family farms.
 

glasshouse

Member
Location
lothians
The EU was a gift to corporate agricultural businesses and the death of local production by small family farms, in the way it subsidised the biggest most, and undercut local labour with free movement of temporary slave labour from abroad. But hey ho, it seems that many want it back.
You are wrong there, the eu wanted subsidies capped to stop corporate farming but the tories and nfu stopped that
 

roscoe erf

Member
Livestock Farmer
Veggie picking and farm labouring was ever done by migrant and itinerant labourers. It’s the same the world over. Tough work, tough conditions, poor pay, requires labourers who will travel, live in basic condition, work like hell to make really good money, relative to what they could at home, in poorer countries.
Brexit Britain has cut off it’s right hand, in pursuit of “sovereignty”! The notion that Eastern European’s in this case, would be replaced by able willing Brits, was never in the slightest bit realistic.
rubbish all our veggie picking was done by local villagers women and men until the eec then it became foreign workers
 

Ashtree

Member
So now that the government can “manage“ immigration, all should be well in the kingdom.
The recent “managed” invite to EU drivers to come to UK to sort out the shortage, was a huge flop. Nobody wants to come. Same apparently now happening with the call for butchers to come back.
 

7610 super q

Never Forgotten
Honorary Member
We used locals to pick our veg till 2007. Never had the need to use Johny Foreigner.
Thing is, it's a young mans job, and not really a " career ". Not many about who've cut cabbage continually for 60 years......
Need to somehow get the yooof interested in manual labour. How, I don't know. I don't think even a substantial increase in pay would do it.
 

glasshouse

Member
Location
lothians
So now that the government can “manage“ immigration, all should be well in the kingdom.
The recent “managed” invite to EU drivers to come to UK to sort out the shortage, was a huge flop. Nobody wants to come. Same apparently now happening with the call for butchers to come back.
Its like the farmer who sacks his combine. Driver at the start of harvest but cant drive it himself.
Then has to beg him to return and he says sod off
Shot in foot big time
 

Mark Hatton

Staff Member
Media
Location
Yorkshire
We used locals to pick our veg till 2007. Never had the need to use Johny Foreigner.
Thing is, it's a young mans job, and not really a " career ". Not many about who've cut cabbage continually for 60 years......
Need to somehow get the yooof interested in manual labour. How, I don't know. I don't think even a substantial increase in pay would do it.
Manual work isn't seen as an attractive career be in in farming or any other industry, look at construction, average age of tradesmen is 56, businesses haven't helped themselves by not training new entrants, we've also bred a generation of 'Want it all' but don't want to lift a finger to get it!
 

thesilentone

Member
Livestock Farmer
Location
Cumbria
I think it's time to look beyond the EU and it's borders. Many Asian workers would jump at the chance to earn the numbers that are possible. Time to offer opportunity globally for those who are willing to work on seasonal contracts.

You need £650 - £1100 a month to live comfortably in Vietnam, many get by on £350.00.

Imagine making over two years salary in a season in the UK picking veg, one thing is for sure, they would do it, and not complain and turn up late.

With Government support, someone should get out there and do some PR selling the opportunity, while at the same time building a partner for the long-term.

The Country is a beautiful sxxt hole and badly needs investment.
 

Ffermer Bach

Member
Livestock Farmer
I don't know what we have done as a society, but we seem to have changed to have less of a work ethic, somehow it seems to be parts of society with an ethic to "get on" who still do, example be Chinese or Indian children who a lot seem to get on into high paying careers
 

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Red Tractor drops launch of green farming scheme amid anger from farmers

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quote: “Red Tractor has confirmed it is dropping plans to launch its green farming assurance standard in April“

read the TFF thread here: https://thefarmingforum.co.uk/index.php?threads/gfc-was-to-go-ahead-now-not-going-ahead.405234/
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