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08.10.2024 / Press releases /
MEDIA ADVISORY: Migrant health workers to speak at Covid-19 Inquiry, 9 & 10 October – watch the live broadcast
The Frontline Migrant Health Workers’ Group (FMHWG), combining United Voices of the World (UVW) & the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB) trade unions, and Kanlungan Filipino Consortium, a charity supporting and representing Filipino and East and Southeast Asian migrant workers in the UK, will provide oral evidence at the Covid-19 Inquiry’s Module 3 hearings on 9-10 October. This is a crucial opportunity to hear first-hand accounts from those at the frontlines of the pandemic, including migrant and low-paid healthcare workers, who were disproportionately affected by it.
In the first months of the pandemic, 83% of the ethnic minority healthcare workers who died from Covid-19 were migrant workers and 53% of the total UK healthcare workers who died were migrants. Despite comprising only 3.8% of the NHS workforce, in the first months of the pandemic, up to May 2020, Filipino nurses accounted for 22% of Covid-19 NHS nurse deaths.
Our members—low-paid, precarious migrant workers, primarily from Black, brown, and other ethnic minorities—were severely impacted by the pandemic. These communities have been, and continue to be, at the heart of an outsourcing system that has privatised facility services in the NHS, reinforcing institutional inequality and structural racism within the public sector.
FMHWG will share powerful testimonies, including from a IWGB cleaner and Alex Marshall, IWGB President and former medical courier, to expose the harsh realities faced by frontline workers in some of the most precarious roles within a public healthcare system, which is chronically underfunded and fragmented over years of outsourcing and privatisation.
FMHWG is represented by the Public Interest Law Centre, alongside barristers Piers Marquis and Diya Sen Gupta KC.
Journalists are encouraged to tune in to the livestream of this critical moment, as FMHWG contributes to the Inquiry’s Module 3.
Livestream can be followed from 10am BST here: https://www.youtube.com/@UKCovid-19Inquiry
Julia Veros González, care worker and UVW member, said:
“The Covid-19 experience was catastrophic. No one knew what was needed, and there was a lot of disorganisation, especially at the beginning. There were few gloves and masks for us to do our jobs, and as a result, many got infected with the virus. In general, there was little respect from society for the work of care workers. While hospitals and other healthcare facilities had strict systems in place to prevent infections, in the caregiving sector, particularly in nursing homes (at least in my experience), there seemed to be few rules or they were inconsistently applied, leaving caregivers unprotected. You felt powerless, and every day you left work thinking, “Did I catch it?” I felt disregarded, our value was zero in the eyes of others because care workers are among the least heard in society. Nurses, doctors… They have a voice. And yet, we are the most important people to those we care for.”
“It’s important that this inquiry leads to a revaluation of caregivers’ work; that it’s seen as just as important as that of doctors or nurses or others who were on the front lines during the pandemic. It was our place to be there because offices closed, and their workers went home, but we had to be there. For example, you would put on gloves, but they would tear while you were washing someone – and then what? Or residents with Alzheimer’s or other mental illnesses would grab you and pull off your mask – what do you do in that situation? You were at much higher risk than even a nurse or a doctor because there weren’t the same protocols and measures, yet you had even more proximity – the patient is inches from your face when you’re washing them, feeding them… And I really suffered a lot because of this.”
Petros Elia, general secretary for United Voices of the World (UVW) union, said:
“UVW members are the carers, cleaners, security guards, porters, caterers, and healthcare workers who at great risk to their health – often without personal protective equipment (PPE) needed to keep them safe – worked on the frontlines to keep London and the country safe, cared for, clean and fed during the pandemic. Some paid the ultimate price.
“Despite their contributions and sacrifices many of these workers are outsourced, seen as second class, treated as second class and given second class terms and conditions. This is unacceptable and we must ensure that all workers, regardless of their status, have access to the protection and pay they need and are employed directly by the places where they work – and not outsourced.
“They are now telling their side of the story, a story of poverty, discrimination, fear and of having to make life threatening choices.
“This government has a moral duty to investigate these findings and address the structural inequality created by outsourcing in the NHS, a ruthless business practice, which meant low-paid, outsourced workers, Black and brown, ethnic and racial minorities were impacted more than any other groups by the pandemic.
“Regardless, UVW will continue to dismantle structural racism, one strike at a time.”
Henry Chango Lopez, General Secretary of the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain (IWGB), said:
“The inquiry has brought into sharp relief the racism and exploitation that run deep within the institutions and infrastructure of this country, meaning certain lives are kept carefully safe whilst others are put readily at risk. The truth is that the devalorising of migrant and racialised workers’ lives did not start with the pandemic, nor did it end as we emerged on the other side. The unthinkable choice that haunted workers throughout each lockdown – whether to risk their safety or go hungry – is the same choice that plagues many of our members now. It’s a decision that confronts everyone from couriers, whose fees are so low they are forced to take risks on the road to make ends meet; to cleaners, who are expected to ruin their health working three jobs on poverty pay; and Uber drivers, who earlier this year were left to fend for themselves against racist mobs deliberately targeting them for attacks. We want our health and wellbeing as migrant, racialised, and precarious workers to be valued as much as anyone else’s. Until that happens, we will continue to speak out and take action in our fight for justice.”
Helen Mowatt, lawyer at PILC, representing FMHWG:
“The voices of frontline, outsourced, low-paid, migrant healthcare workers are essential to understanding the true cost of the pandemic. Overlooked by the government and seen as disposable by private employers, their precarious employment and immigration status left them overexposed and unprotected. Our clients call on the Inquiry to recommend an end to outsourcing and privatisation in the NHS, and to dismantle a system that exploits workers by tying their visas to the acceptance of the most dangerous jobs.”
Lorie Halliday, Kanlungan director:
“Filipino and other migrant, Black, and racialised healthcare workers were systematically chosen to be sent to the frontline of the pandemic, even when this meant losing their lives. These deaths were the result of the Hostile Environment, which has put in place punitive policies that restrict migrants’ abilities to change employer and access public funds, combined with institutional racism entrenched in the NHS, which treats migrant workers as commodities that can be sacrificed. We must honour our community members who died by fighting for the Hostile Environment to be abolished and for migrant workers to have equal rights, safety, and dignity at work.”
For further information contact the UVW comms team:
Cristina: 07548 759340
Isabel: 07706 987443
Jim: 07749 765264
E-mail: comms@uvwunion.org.uk
Notes for editors
United Voices of the World is an anti-racist, member-led, direct action, campaigning trade union and we exist to support and empower the most vulnerable groups of precarious, low-paid and predominantly BAME and migrant workers in the UK. We fight the bosses through direct action on the streets and through the courts and demand that all members receive at least the London Living Wage, full pay, sick pay, dignity, equality and respect.
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