Latest news with #migrantLabour
The Sun
14-06-2025
- Business
- The Sun
Channel migrants queue for cash in hand jobs as secrets of UK's £260bn illegal economy revealed
CASH-in-hand labour by migrants who crossed the Channel is a driving force in the UK's illegal economy, which is worth an astonishing £260billion. A Sun on Sunday investigation found how those coming here illegally on small boats are working for knock-down prices as they are exploited by unscrupulous bosses. 6 6 6 Economic experts estimate that the size of the entire illegal economy is worth a quarter of a trillion pounds — equivalent to ten per cent of Britain's entire output. This deprives the Treasury of billions at the very time economists are warning that Chancellor Rachel Reeves faces increasing taxes to fund her £113billion expenditure on major building projects. It is estimated that £2.2billion-worth of tax is evaded annually by individuals or firms operating entirely in the black economy. Figures from the National Centre for Social Research (NatCen) suggest that one in 11 adults are now involved in the black economy here — with a high level of migration since 2022 linked to the amount of cash-in-hand work. Nigel Farage said: 'The British people are being taken for fools again. We already know that our borders are in chaos. 'But thanks to successive Labour and Tory governments, those arriving then go on to work illegally on the £260billion black-market economy — all the while we are paying for their accommodation.' The reality behind these statistics was evident at first light last week as a group of 20 men — including those from Afghanistan — huddled beneath a flyover in Barking, East London. They were attempting to find work as labourers for as little as £30 a day. One of them, who gave his name as Torab and said he was 23, claimed he had arrived in the UK on a dinghy. He said: 'I arrived in England on a tiny boat with 48 people. The boat was so small I thought it was going to sink. Fury as hotel firm housing asylum seekers in 'all-inclusive resorts' paid £700M a year of YOUR money 'I live in Luton, in a hotel with other asylum seekers. Two people in my room, me and another man from Afghanistan. I come here to Barking two, three times a week. It takes about one and a half hours. I arrive here no later than 6.30am. I don't know if the work will come. 'I normally do building work, carpentry, but will do whatever there is. 'They give me £70 a day, sometimes £80. I think it's a fair price.' Ato, 33, from Accra, Ghana, who said he arrived in the UK in the back of a lorry, moaned: 'There's too many people here today. 'The cars come and you have to run to get a job first before the others waiting, but there are always more than 15 people trying. 'I come twice a week normally. I used to come more but there is little work here now. 'When the work comes, the pay is not so good. They're long days, lots of hours, and sometimes it's just £30 or £40. Sometimes people don't get paid. Yes, I like the UK because there are jobs. But it's hard with no money, with no work.' At 6am last Monday, there were around 15 to 20 men waiting but that had increased to 30 by 7.30am. Some wore backpacks and carried paint-smeared buckets and tools. The following day, 15 miles away in Stanmore, North West London, a queue of men gathered outside a builders' merchant — not to work there but hoping to be transported to jobs elsewhere. A red Toyota car pulled up and the passenger doors opened, causing a rush of men to try to get in. After less than a couple of minutes of apparent negotiations with the driver, just three men got in, leaving the others looking disappointed at failing to land work. 6 6 The same scenes are said to be common in cities up and down the country. In Leeds, migrants congregated on a road to try to get cash-in-hand work on Thursday morning, as builders' vans pulled up. At 8am two of the waiting men approached our reporters and asked if they were looking for workers. One man, who said he was Romanian and called Alex, asked in broken English: 'You got any work? I'm a very good builder, very good paver.' He said he turned up every day to the same roadside spot, hoping to be picked up for a shift, quoting £100 for a full day's labour, insisting on cash only. His pal, who also said he was from eastern Europe, said: 'I'm a builder — brickwork, tile work, plasterboard work. I can do it for you.' Asked why they stood on that particular corner, he nodded towards passing vehicles on a busy main road: 'Because of the English guys in vans, they stop for us.' The number of people participating in the black market for jobs has grown by 80 per cent since 2016, according to NatCen's report. A rise in the level of illegal migration was one of the main factors blamed for this. Politicians in France, where the authorities are accused of failing to stop migrants boarding Dover-bound small boats, have blamed Britain's lax tax rules and lack of enforcement action as key reasons. But last week the Home Office boasted there had been a 51 per cent surge in the number of arrests in immigration enforcement since the general election last year. Facebook was reported by The Times last week to have a vast illegal market in delivery app log-ins, such as Deliveroo, being offered for 'rent' to black market workers. Conservative leader Kemi Badenoch said: 'Britain's being mugged. This black-market economy is undermining real businesses and sucking cash out of public services. 'Labour promised to smash the gangs, but Starmer cancelled the only workable deterrent, and now we're seeing the highest numbers of small boat crossings on record. Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said: 'Unscrupulous employers and illegal workers will be held to account under this Government — since coming into power we have increased raids and arrests for illegal working by 50 per cent compared to the previous year, with 9,000 visits and 6,410 arrests. 'We must not stand for this. The rules need to be respected and enforced." KICK THEM OUT NOW By Nigel Farage, Leader of the Reform Party ON Question Time last week, Labour's clueless Treasury minister Darren Jones made an extraordinary claim. He told the BBC's top debate show that 'the majority of people in these boats are children, babies and women' when they cross the Channel. This is simply not true. The Government's own website states: 'Seventy per cent of people detected arriving irregularly have been adult males aged 18 and over.' And — thanks to the exclusive Sun on Sunday investigation published here — we now know what many of them get up to once they arrive. The British people are being taken for fools again. We already know that our borders are in chaos. But, thanks to successive Labour and Tory governments, those arriving then go on to work illegally on the £260billion black market economy. And all the while we pay for their accommodation. If Barking in East London is anything to go by, this scandal is playing out in towns and cities right across the country. Nearly 40,000 boat migrants have arrived since Labour came to power — and numbers are up 40 per cent on this time last year. How many of these already work on the black market without paying tax? Labour has long championed the mantra of British jobs for British workers. But brickies and builders are being undercut by illegal labour. Britain is in social and economic decline. The social contract is stretched to its limits. People that pay their taxes and play by the rules increasingly feel shafted. Yes, these migrants may be victims of exploitation — but they are also part of the criminal economy. Unscrupulous bosses are laughing all the way to the bank while British workers get priced out again. I was the first to highlight the impending invasion of young, un- documented males. Most of the media ignored me. But we can now see I was right. Immigration is out of control. The situation in the Channel is a security emergency. If we cannot stop this in Barking, how on earth will we control the borders in Dover? Keir Starmer's soft touch is laughable. He promised to smash the gangs — but all he has smashed are illegal immigration records. The only way to deal with this problem is to say everyone that comes to Britain illegally will be deported — and actually mean it. That means leaving the European Convention on Human Rights. We need immediate deportations.
Mail & Guardian
16-05-2025
- General
- Mail & Guardian
Migrant labour in the digital age exploited
(Graphic: John McCann/M&G) The wealth of white South Africa was first built on the expropriation of land, and then the exploitation of black labour, much of it migrant labour. The lives of men from places like Sul do Save in Mozambique and eMampondweni in the Eastern Cape were consumed by the mines. Women left their families to work in white people's homes. Black exploitation — organised through containment and surveillance and legitimated by racism — produced systemic impoverishment. While remnants of the old system of migrant labour remain, such as the decaying hostels in some of our cities, the passbooks have gone, as have the trains — the metal snakes that carried the men to the mines. Hugh Masekela's Stimela is a song about the past. But new forms of migrant labour still generate corporate wealth, and enable the ease of middle-class life. In the suburbs and gated communities, the most visible form of migrant labour is the growing number of men making deliveries on motorcycles. A rider from Malawi explains that he cannot begin to enjoy even the most basic pleasures of life until he has saved R30 000. This is the cost of repatriating his body if he is killed on the job. A rider working without making provision for the possibility of death risks binding his family to debt. It has been said that riding a delivery motorcycle is the most dangerous job in South Africa. The labour movement has always carried limits to its understanding of what counts as work, who counts as a worker and what counts as a workplace. These limits have often been shaped by broader lines of exclusion, such as race, caste, nationality and gender. Domestic work has seldom been taken as seriously as other forms of work. Sex work has seldom been understood as work. When contemporary trade unions draw on narrow understandings of 19th-century ideas and 20th-century experiences, they are unable to take adequate measure of changing forms of work. Planetary pain Capital's offensive against unions has been significantly boosted by the rise of the gig economy in general, and 'platform-based' work in particular. By recasting exploitative corporations as 'platforms', and workers as 'independent contractors' or 'entrepreneurs', capital has absolved itself of responsibilities that, in many societies, had come to be seen as basic obligations to workers. It has also enabled new and totalising forms of surveillance. There is frequently no paid leave, no compensation for accidents, no life insurance or pension and no provision for breaks to rest, use the toilet and eat. Payment is usually for jobs completed rather than time worked, and people are summarily removed from the apps without any kind of due process or recourse for unfair practices. A motorcycle courier deemed to be an independent contractor is under constant pressure to meet delivery times, navigate dangerous roads and neighbourhoods, and absorb the costs of fuel, maintenance and repairs. 'Platform' work is a planetary phenomenon, as evident in London as in Johannesburg. In India, it is estimated that there are about 7.7 million people working with digital 'platforms'. One study concludes that about 23.5 million will be working this way in five years' time. In Brazil, about 1.5 million people are working through 'platforms'. The 'platforms' do not only organise the exploitation of labour in new forms of work, such as delivering food using apps. They are also bringing older forms of work, such as domestic work, under their control. This shift has been accompanied by the development of a more decentralised and less institutionally mediated ideological configuration — shaped by Pentecostal churches, social media, videos and podcasts — that celebrates a vision of individual success. Wealth is presented as virtue, and the entrepreneur as a heroic figure. In this world, many prefer the seduction of Instagram to the community or union meeting, and the hope of making it on their own to collective organisation. This new ideological landscape intersects with older forms of domination and exclusion. In India, platform workers are mostly from oppressed castes. In Brazil, this form of labour is strongly racialised. A study by the late Eddie Webster and Fikile Masikane found about 90% of food courier riders in Johannesburg are migrants. Warren McGregor, the programme coordinator of the Global Labour University at Wits, argues that this is one reason why established unions in South Africa have not shown much interest in organising riders and drivers. He explains that the limited support they have received has primarily come from labour support organisations. As is the case around the world, riders and drivers in South Africa have formed WhatsApp groups to share warnings, organise mutual aid and discuss issues. These networks are a modest but potentially significant step toward self-organisation. Brazil In Brazil, the Movimento dos Trabalhadores Sem Teto (MTST) — the Homeless Workers' Movement, which has growing connections to Abahlali baseMjondolo in South Africa — is the most significant movement of the urban poor. It organises around land and building occupations, offering shelter and solidarity to people excluded from formal housing. Its social base is made up largely of informal and precarious workers — especially women and black Brazilians — many of whom work in construction, domestic service and recycling but still cannot afford to formally rent or own homes in the cities where they labour. The MTST has extended its work to 'platform' labour. It has supported the formation of cooperatives such as Liga Coop, a driver-owned and managed e-hailing service, and Señoritas Courier, a feminist, worker-owned delivery cooperative. It has also helped to create tools like the chatbot Contrate Quem Luta (Hire Those Who Struggle), which connects clients to marginalised workers. In some occupations, the movement has also established rest spaces where food delivery riders — many working long, isolated hours under algorithmic control — can pause to eat, rest, charge their phones and use the toilet. India In India, workers have organised around slogans such as 'Rating nahi, haq chahiye (We want rights, not ratings)' and 'Insaan hai hum, ghulaam nahi (We are human beings, not slaves)'. Committed work by and in support of 'platform' workers has resulted in important advances. In 2023, the state of Rajasthan passed a law extending labour rights and protections to these workers. Last year, draft Bills were introduced in Karnataka and Jharkhand with the aim of enacting similar gains. The draft Telangana Gig and Platform Workers (Social Security and Welfare) Bill, introduced last month, proposes a Welfare Board, automatic registration of workers, contributions from platform companies, protection against arbitrary deactivation, and mechanisms for resolving disputes. Crucially, it also calls for algorithmic transparency and access to data —issues central to workers' ability to contest how their labour is managed. These proposals are the result of sustained organising by the Telangana Gig and Platform Workers Union. In Karnataka, the United Food Delivery Partners' Union (UFDPU) has played a similar role. According to its president, Vinay Sarathy, while companies claim the workforce is transient, 'many workers in this sector work full-time' and are 'compelled to work 12 to 15 hours a day' to earn a basic living. Yet, they remain outside all formal labour protections. 'There is a constant fear of termination of work through ID blocking,' he notes, which leaves workers without income or recourse. Fundamental rights such as the freedom to organise are also under threat. Despite these hurdles, the UFDPU and other groups have helped secure some social protections for platform workers — but, as Sarathy stresses, 'the central issue — formal recognition of gig workers as workers under labour law — remains unresolved.' One of the UFDPU's practical demands speaks directly to the everyday indignities faced by riders: that restaurants be obliged to allow delivery workers access to toilets. The All India General Strike called for 20 May will include the demand for 'platform' workers to be recognised as workers. McGregor argues that in South Africa the struggles of 'platform' workers are nascent, and 'an opportunity to change long-standing and traditional modes of organising', and to revitalise the labour movement from below. In this context, even modest forms of organisation — WhatsApp groups, small associations and sporadic strikes — can begin to open fragments of political possibility. Richard Pithouse is distinguished research fellow at the Global Centre for Advanced Studies, an international research scholar at the University of Connecticut and professor at large at the University of the Western Cape.
