Agriculture: Migrant Workers

(asked on 16th March 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, whether he plans to issue guidance on minimum qualifying annual pay for EU nationals seeking permits to work in the agricultural industry.


Answered by
Rebecca Pow Portrait
Rebecca Pow
Parliamentary Under-Secretary (Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs)
This question was answered on 19th March 2020

This Government is fully committed to protecting the rights of migrant workers and ensuring that they are treated fairly in the workforce, including seasonal workers in agriculture.

In recent years, there has been tremendous change to wider employment legislation, which protects and benefits workers in all sectors of the economy. The national minimum wage has been raised and the new national living wage introduced.

A key objective of the Seasonal Workers Pilot, a scheme for non-EEA migrant workers, is to ensure that they are adequately protected against modern slavery and other labour abuses. The operators of the scheme are licensed by the Gangmasters Labour and Abuse Authority (GLAA). The GLAA ensure that all workers are placed with farms who adhere to all relevant legislation, including paying the National Minimum Wage.

Reticulating Splines