Book: HIRED - Six months undercover in low-wage Britain

Could you survive working in an Amazon warehouse, or at a call centre, or driving an Uber? Journalist James Bloodworth spent six months trying to make ends meet on zero-hour contracts. In the process he gained insights into why the UK voted for Brexit, what feeds anti-immigrant sentiments, how people become trapped in hopelessness, how easy it is to end up homeless, and how hard-working, hard-pressed people surrender to an unhealthy lifestyle.

This is a shattering book, and absolutely essential reading for anyone wishing to understand modern Britain. Working as a £7 an hour "picker" at the Amazon warehouse in Rugeley, Bloodworth walked 10 miles a day, constantly prompted to work harder by ever-present Orwellian messaging, and regimented like a prisoner, with totalitarian rules it was impossible not to violate. His employment agency repeatedly short-changed him, while tribunal fees introduced in 2013 meant any legal remedy was unrealistic. Most staff were Eastern Europeans who were desperate for work and afraid of the bosses.

"Few English locals I spoke to were willing to put up with the conditions," Bloodworth reports, and there was a massive drop-out rate.

More depressing still is Blackpool, heaving with the homeless, the addicted, the suicidal and the working poor. Bloodworth works as a care assistant, unable to spend more than a few moments with each old person he visits on his hectic daily rounds. The generation that fought in Korea and against the Nazis deserve better than the outsourced "service" they receive, he comments. Half a million care visits between 2010 and 2013 lasted five minutes or less, as carers paid minimum wage rushed to meet their quota. He describes a level of "fearful compliance" among Eastern European workers, some of whom could not read instructions or medicine bottles. Moreover, the "clients" were denied their one daily interlude of human contact, such was the pressure on carers to move on rapidly. "I would see the disappointment etched on their faces as we dashed out of their front door: the realisation that even a brief chat was too much to ask for." No wonder 47% of care workers leave their posts within a year.

Bloodworth concludes that the fortunate among us ignore the hardship endured by the working poor "just as our grandparents turned contentedly away from what went on 4,000 miles away in an Indian sweatshop." He laments the decline of the unions, which educated workers about their rights, and built solidarity. He also paints a dismal picture of Britain's grim and violent little towns where "dull and identikit chain stores offering the same sensory experience," have replaced individual high street shops. No wonder people feel British culture has been overwhelmed. "Ronald McDonald should take more of the blame than Eastern European fruit-pickers," he concludes.

HIRED - Six months undercover in low-wage Britain by James Bloodworth, Atlantic books, £12.99

For more information see: https://atlantic-books.co.uk/book/hired/