To understand why some meat factory workers chose to work through Covid-19 during the worst peaks of the pandemic, encouraging the spread of the virus in workplace clusters of up to 200 cases, you need to understand the underlying conditions surrounding their jobs.

While Part 1 of our investigation touched on the industry’s overall poor health and safety record, another main concern for workers is pay. The average wage for a meat operative is €22,000/year while a more skilled carcase deboner would get €27,500/year. When it comes to preventing Covid-19 infections, what becomes more important is what workers live on when they must stay away from the jobs that pays these wages.

The industry association Meat Industry Ireland (MII) admitted that just 20 per cent of meat factory workers had access to an employer-funded sick pay scheme, yet the remaining workers should have had access to the €350/week Enhanced Illness Benefit if they got Covid-19 or had to self-isolate as a result of being a close contact.

However, the Independent Workers Union (IWU) in Cork claimed that some workers did not even have access to the Enhanced Illness Benefit for Covid-19.

This should have been impossible because anyone employed or self-employed should have been able to have enough earned PRSI stamps to entitle them to the payment. 

At the time in June 2020, the rules around the Illness Benefit stated: “You must be under pensionable age which is currently 66. You must have at least 104 class A, E,H or P social insurance (PRSI) contributions paid since first starting work, and either one of the following: 39 weeks of PRSI contributions paid or credited in the relevant tax year, of which 13 must be paid contributions.”

Further digging found that the IWU were correct because of a letterbox-style subcontracting situation in at least one meat factory in Cork. 

The scheme involved a recruiter called AA Recruitment getting Romanian workers based in a factory in Cork to sign a contract that technically set them up as sole traders in Poland. 

This effectively meant that the workers were not making PRSI contributions in Ireland, so when it came to claiming the Illness Benefit they did not have enough PRSI stamps. 

Documents obtained from a source showed that the Scope section of the Department of Social Protection was investigating the matter and had ruled the self-employed contract was effectively bogus. 

Throughout the Department investigation, the factory’s management and AA maintained the worker the case was based on was self-employed.

The Department investigation noted: “He [the worker] did not get holiday or sick pay. If he didn’t come into work he didn’t get paid.”

The investigation also found that AA was remunerated as part of the service for creating the contract. Rent and accounting fees were deducted from the wage of the worker, who was paid €10/hour.

“Payment was then made by AA Euro Recruitment to its Polish subsidiary [AA Recruitment Poland Spzoo] in respect of those workers on self-employed Polish contracts,” the investigation found.

“The payment is converted in Polish zlotys. Deductions for Polish tax and social insurance are paid to the Polish authorities.”

This contract format affected up to 40 Romanian workers but it was not known how many other factories were using this subcontracting system and how many more workers did not have access to the Illness Benefit if they had Covid-19.

At the time AA Euro was also advertising for meat workers in Kildare. 

In Germany, subcontracting in meat factories had become a serious issue over the pandemic and the government moved to ban it after an outbreak of 1,500 cases among workers in a pig factory, where poor living and working conditions were exposed and the German army was drafted in to test workers.

In Ireland as well, authorities seemed to have woken up to the issue and almost immediately after the reporting of the AA Euro case became public, the Employment Status Investigation Unit (ESIU) in the Department of Social Protection launched hundreds of investigations into the employment status of workers in meat factories. In contrast, the next highest number was in the construction sector with just 25 investigations. 

On February 24 this year, then Minister for Social Protection Heather Humphreys said in response to a parliamentary question that the ESIU team, made up of five inspectors, had investigated 421 companies since the start of 2019 “in a wide range of sectors, including the construction, meat processing, retail, fitness and language training sectors”. Of these investigations, 317 were in meat factories; all in 2020. The next highest number was in the construction sector with just 27 investigations.  

Humphreys added that 205 investigations were concluded overall, resulting in PRSI savings of €279,300.”

Another parliamentary response from Tánaiste Leo Varadkar in March on WRC inspections into meat factories found that out of 61 inspections between 2016 and 2020, almost half were found to have breaches. 

“Almost €184,000 in outstanding wages were recovered by the WRC for workers in the meat processing sector in the period 2015 to 2020,” the Tánaiste said.

He also outlined the measures factories faced if they were found to be in breach of legislation:

• Fixed penalty notice: An employer may be required to pay a fixed amount in respect of breaches of employment law (e.g., €1,500 in relation to failure to provide payslips);
• Compliance notice: These require employers to take specific action to remedy contraventions over a range of employment law and failure to comply with the notice could result in a prosecution;
• Prosecution: Employers can be prosecuted in relation to a range of contraventions, including failure to pay statutory national minimum wage rate, employment of foreign nationals without permission to work and failure to keep employment records as prescribed in law.

There is no explanation for the contrast between the number of cases taken on by the ESIU and the WRC, especially since both seem to have found grave areas of concern in the area of meat factory employment that don’t relate to other sectors. 

On the issue of the self-employment contracts in Cork I went back to source to discover that the 40 cases had still not been heard by the WRC.

“They still aren’t willing to address claims after a fucking year and a half,” they said. 

Asked about the delay, a WRC spokesperson said it had accelerated the scheduling of cases this year, including through the introduction of remote hearings, to address the backlog accumulated during the pandemic and as a result of legislative changes required by a Supreme Court decision in April. 

“Cases currently being submitted to the WRC are being processed from initial complaint to decision in approximately 36 weeks, subject to the complexity of the case. On average, pre-covid cases were concluded in approximately 24-32 weeks,” the spokesperson said.

AA Euro had also pushed back the date of the case, saying one of their representatives involved would be on annual leave. 

Frustratingly for the source as well, many of the workers involved had left or gone home to Romania. They had found better jobs in other places in Ireland or just finished a cycle of work in a country where they were only ever planning on staying for a short duration. The length of time it was taking to get the hearing seemed to be working out well for AA Euro. 

Even though the Department of Social Protection had effectively found that the self-employed contracts were bogus in the case of one worker, they still had to go before the WRC and the level of paperwork involved was “like going before the Supreme Court,” the source said. 

Even if they win the case, the source points out that all it will mean is up to four weeks’ pay for each worker.In their opinion, what is really needed instead is a complete overhaul and investigation by Revenue, who could be owed tax money. 

“Critical and serious” labour supply issues

The transient nature of workers seemed to work to the advantage of meat factories, with management paying little heed to workers’ calls for better pay or conditions because they knew they would only be there for a short timeframe. 

Ironically, this treatment now seems to be backfiring with factories finding it almost impossible to get workers in Ireland.

The UK is little better and prisoners there have started being used as labour because factories are so desperate to keep the kill lines moving. 

“Labour continues to be a huge issue and it is very critical and serious for us at this stage. We’re not alone on that front and we have sought more permits to try and help the situation because we have to deal with the issue at this stage,” said MII director Cormac Healy.

“We do need some injection of labour,” he added. “I mean, we’re bad and you can look across at the UK and elsewhere as well. It’s a pretty serious issue.” 

A source said Polish and Romanian workers now prefer German factories “because they are closer to home and are more up to date with better health and safety.” This came as a bit of a shock to hear after seeing 1,500 cases last June and the German army brought in to help. 

But according to the source, Irish factories are more old-fashioned and the HIQA report said that facilities to help prevent Covid-19 cases would not be in place until 2022. 

The source said that factories are having to go as far away as China to recruit and parts of the country were starting to look like a “little Chinatown”.

“But the Chinese won’t put up with shit conditions,” they said. 

“They have demands and already one factory is investing millions into new facilities to try and keep them.” 

The dust is settling around the pandemic and the bustle in towns and villages can be heard again as people return to school and work. But many businesses will continue to count the cost of the last 18 months.

As they reflect on a period when every business was asked to make sacrifices, the question remains whether all of them took their fair share of the burden.