Best of British but nobody to harvest it
Friday 18 April, 2008
Harvesting premium quality West Lancashire salads and vegetables within tight time periods could prove virtually impossible this year due to a lack of foreign agricultural workers.
On a recent tour to the area organised by the NFU, Defra Minister of State, Lord Rooker, visited Liz and Jerome Fairclough of Pool Hey House Farm in Southport to find out how and why the Seasonal Agricultural Workers Scheme (SAWS) is failing them.
The couple are specialist salad growers who use foreign labour but strongly believe there will be a shortage of willing workers this year because the 16,250 immigrants permitted to work here via the SAWS scheme have to come from Bulgaria and Romania - countries whose workforce are beginning to prefer jobs away from agriculture. Like the NFU, the
(From left to right): Liz Fairclough, Rosie Cooper MP for West Lancs, Jerome Fairclough, Lord Rooker, Robin Cropper, Sarah Fairhurst, Robert Sinton and Kathryn Wright.
Faircloughs believe approximately 21,000 workers are needed and that they should be allowed to come from any EU country.
Surrounded by members of the NFU North West Horticulture Board, Liz Fairclough told Lord Rooker that she and her husband had tried to employ local lads from the Skelmersdale and Southport areas but although they were good workers, they were unprepared to go out in the fields at 5am every morning.
Lord Rooker recognised the genuine concerns of growers that are unable to get the seasonal staff they need this year from labour providers like Concordia. He did stress however, that in order to take things forward he needs real examples of the staff shortages from both last year and this year, and how this has affected the businesses concerned, to strengthen the case. This will enable him to tackle this issue with the Home Office. Unfortunately at this moment, the Home Office don't appear that concerned.
Lord Rooker's visit to West Lancashire took place on Tuesday 08 April.
Read the full article about Lord Rooker's visit to West Lancashire in the May edition of British Farmer and Grower which will be with NFU members from Friday 25 April.
