Food: the rotten state of Europe
By Pete North - September 28, 2021
In the dismal mind of the common or garden remainer, the European food system is a one of Rolls Royce standards and impeccable labour rights protected by our glorious European Union. Meanwhile, on planet earth, the Guardian has finally discovered that the whole system is rotten.
Europe’s meat industry came into sharp political focus in 2020 when plants became hotspots for coronavirus transmission. Precarious workers were particularly vulnerable, as many say they did not have sick pay and they feared for their jobs if they could not work because of illness. In addition, substandard accommodation – often cramped, squalid conditions – made social distancing or self-isolation extremely challenging. It was reported that some companies also lacked the necessary data to be able to trace the outbreak.
Migrant workers in the meat industry are an invisible group. “In Dutch stores you can see what kind of life an animal has had – we have a star system for animal welfare. But ironically, you can’t see what conditions people in the slaughterhouse were working under.”
The Guardian has learned how precarious workers often have undefined working hours, zero-hours contracts and no overtime or statutory sick pay. They describe living in a state of extreme insecurity in countries where they do not speak the language and struggle to understand agreements and their legal rights. Workers also report having to pay agencies high costs for overcrowded housing, and may working for hours – sometimes weeks – without pay. Those living in housing supplied by intermediaries told the Guardian they feel powerless and fear they will end up on the streets if work ends.
A “phased” contract system, operated by some agencies, can keep workers on the lowest pay for extended periods. In the Netherlands, for example, workers allege they are often let go before they are legally due a pay increase or pension contributions, then rehired on a similar contract.
The Guardian “has uncovered evidence of a two-tier employment system with workers subjected to sub-standard pay and conditions to fulfil the meat industry’s need for a replenishable source of low-paid, hyper-flexible workers”.
We must, of course, congratulate the Guardian for uncovering that which has been known to just about anyone who ever took even a cursory look at the industry. We have noted the same conditions in the 2 Sisters food group, noting that it is replicated across the entire industry and much the same can be said of the haulage sector.
The Guardian goes on to note that employers have depressed wages by bringing workers from countries where wages are low and as the economies of countries such as Poland have improved, and the need for a replenishable source of cheap labour increased, the search has extended to countries such as Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Vietnam, the Philippines, Timor-Leste, Georgia, India, China and Armenia. Our liberal immigration policies are there to serve a Europe-wide exploitation machine so that we can have cheap mass produced convenience foods.
In due course we will no doubt see the same sort of intensified whinging we have seen from the haulage industry, with food producers bewailing the lack of wage slaves to exploit, supported by lurid headlines about the threat to our Christmas dinners. Again it won’t matter to the remainer press that the shortage of workers is a pan-European problem nor will it especially care that the entire system is predicated on a system of low wage exploitation. They who spent the last five years weeping over the loss of “EU worker’s rights” will be rushing to the defence of Ranjit Singh Boporan’s grubby food empire.
The question is now whether the government will cave to pressure from food industry lobbyists and expand visa quotas for the industry, but like haulage, even if it does, it may find that there is no reserve pool of labour to call on. The industry has only one option: to train and to pay properly – the one thing it wants to avoid at all costs.
The bottom line is that the entire European food industry cannot get by in its current form without treating workers worse than the livestock they kill. Our food has been too cheap for too long because of a concentration of the industry into a very small number of giant factories. Where once we had smaller local slaughterhouses, with now have corporate scale Covid incubators more akin to an Amazon distribution warehouse than what came before.
Here the government has an opportunity to undo the damage of the single market system and revert to a better functioning model, not least since the decrepit EU system is contingent on vets for which there is another global shortage. Nobody trains for years to become a vet so they can stick a thermometer up a dead pig. But that demands the government stays the course and make the changes instead of caving into corporate lobbyists and whinging remainer celebs.
Though this government has done an about face on the Brexit agenda to become a second rate New Labour, obsessed with “climate change”, there probably isn’t a lot it can do to prevent the systemic change in motion. As much as further liberalising work visas is politically unpopular, it probably won’t do them any good unless they can persuade Muslim Afghan refugees to work in sausage factories. Good luck with that.
Whether it’s the food industry, waste disposal and recycling, manufacturing or haulage, we have seen over the last thirty years a race to the bottom in terms of standards, pay and welfare, all to deliver goods at rock bottom prices but there are far reaching consequences for this that go beyond mere economics. The gearing of our economy to bottom dollar consumerism has had a profound effect on the spiritual and cultural life of the country, and not for the better. We’re going to have to get used to the fact that food is expensive to produce, it shouldn’t be as cheap as it is, and if we want immigration control, then we’re going to have to pay for it (one way or another).
At this point we begin to see just how shallow and empty the case for remaining in the EU really was. It was less about a vision of European unity and cooperation as having their bellies full at a price that affords them cheap jollies overseas where they don’t have to queue at airports. We now see just how disingenuous their concern for worker’s rights really was. Brexit and Covid have pulled back the curtain and they really don’t want us to look. It’s a little too inconvenient.
The economy is gradually rebalancing and adapting to Brexvid, in which we now see wages rising for lorry drivers and offers of training. If that is then replicated in other sectors then there’s your “tangible benefits” right there. It may also mean that inflated costs make some activities no longer viable such as recycling. An EU mandated scam we should have abandoned years ago. Though the Tories don’t have the imagination to do anything useful with Brexit, circumstances will eventually demand a rethink when rubbish mountains pile up. If we then see the food industry hiring on a sustainable basis and paying a living wage, and a revival of local production, Brexit will have worked a miracle.
That, mind you, is a big if. Only if there is continual political pressure will any of this happen. Were our politics functioning we would have a Labour party leaping on the opportunity to push up wages and working stamndards, reviving employment for the working classes. Instead it’s coming to the defence of food corporates and greedy bosses. The political pressure will have to come from elsewhere not least since Labour is still struggling with basic female anatomy.
It may be news the The Guardian that the food industry is in a rotten state, but now they’ve caught up, they may eventually make the link between the mechanisation of food and the single market. They may even wake up to the consequences of uncontrolled immigration. It seems every shortages we experience sheds more light on the corruption of trade in the EU. On a long enough timeline even The Graun might have to admit that Brexiters were right.