For many months Unite’s food and agriculture activists have been extremely concerned over the way workers are being packed into factories and field, many of them migrant workers often living in cramped and squalid conditions.

Unite has said that ... these workers were at risk of contracting the virus.

... [Unite] have heard of 450 workers at four food factories across England and Wales testing positive for coronavirus, including over 150 at an Asda-owned site in West Yorkshire ...

... at least 73 vegetable pickers at AS Green & Co, a farm in Herefordshire, have been confirmed as having Covid-19. The farm sells mainly broccoli, broad beans and runner beans to Sainsbury’s, Asda, M&S and Aldi supermarkets. ...

A statement from the farm said, “Our staff are our priority ... We contacted Public Health England (PHE) and we are working closely with them and public health at Herefordshire council to prevent the spread of Covid-19.”

Most of the farm’s workforce are usually drawn from eastern Europe, but travel restrictions this year forced it to launch a local recruitment drive too.

Unite has had many concerns about the safety of picking and packing – not a job you can easily distance yourself in. ... Unite believes that [localised outbreaks] could also apply to packers and that the living conditions of many low-paid workers in such close quarters is a contributing factor, as well as time spent working in communal spaces. ...

[A woman worker noted that she] shared one of the 33 mobile homes on the site at a cost of £50 each per week, earning £8.85 per hour for the first 48 hours a week and £11.06 thereafter, often working 12-hour shifts or longer.

... she claimed there were financial penalties for staff. “People were punished for getting stuff wrong or being too slow. ..."

... Wage theft happens with workers throughout Unite’s many sectors. But in agriculture many migrant workers face difficult challenges. Apart from the obvious language and not knowing your rights issues, there may well be an intimidating atmosphere in the workplace and people just don’t feel able to ask questions or to challenge what they’ve been paid.