When will politicians finally stop EU free movement of labour laws being used in such exploitative ways by big corporations? Quote: "A former Next worker has revealed that cheap Polish staff are being bussed in to the firm’s warehouse after getting jobs in an area where local unemployment is high. Paul Crowcroft spoke as a Mirror ­investigation found Eastern Europeans were being shipped over to fill the minimum wage posts weeks before they are even advertised here in Britain.'" www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/ne ... sh-4709994

When will politicians finally stop EU free movement of labour laws being used in such exploitative ways by big corporations? Quote: "A former Next worker has revealed that cheap Polish staff are being bussed in to the firm’s warehouse after getting jobs in an area where local unemployment is high. Paul Crowcroft spoke as a Mirror ­investigation found Eastern Europeans were being shipped over to fill the minimum wage posts weeks before they are even advertised here in Britain.'" www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/ne ... sh-4709994

Very simple, just go to the agency involved and register with them - if the British citizens numbered in the "high unemployment" area are so concerned then the posts will be available to them too, its actually more expensive for an agency to take a Polish citizen onto their books than a UK one so they should be delighted to accept them.

Truth is it will be very short term work with no guaranteed hours and coming off out of work benefits/unemployment register will be too much bother.

As said the jobs are short term, various hours etc. According to tonights news there are about 800 jobs, 500 filled locally and approx. 200 from Poland with about 100 left. All the jobs are apparently minimum wage and in some cases not enough hours for some to take for such a short period of time. Maybe if Next considered paying a decent wage rather than thinking of their profits and expecting the taxpayer to subsidise them as an employer the story would be different.

Sounds like NEXT are trying to get maximum graft for minimum pay and don't really give a monkey's how they do it.

Yep, though it's not just the wage that's the issue. It's the terms as well that are vital. As you rightly point out they're low hours for a short period. These type of jobs often are no or very low guaranteed hours yet require the employee to be available throughout the entire week, often including evenings and weekends. Not to mention childcare or transport issues for some people.

Then add in they're often boring, mind numbing jobs, tightly controlled by rubbish managers/supervisors who have no idea how to manage/supervise staff.

Then add in that there's little to no opportunity for further work.
Then add in that any money earned will be deducted from any JSA payments and you can see why, even taking the wage out of the equation, people would rather stay on JSA. It's just far easier for people.
And before anyone says it, the way to change it isn't to make JSA worse, it's to make employment better.

As a side issue, I'd actually rather we were importing labour for this kind of work than skilled labour just because both public and private sector can't be bothered to train and skill British labour properly.

You didn't actually read the article before posting that, did you?

Between HMRC and DWP, there should be enough information to determine just how much Working Tax Credit has been paid to employees. This amount should be repaid to the exchequer, by the relevant employers before any shareholder dividends or director bonuses are awarded.

Yep, I did, and as you'd expect the newspaper doesn't tell the whole story.

I happen to know the agency that provides ad-hoc labour to Next, I've actually been to that site, I know how the agencies work and I know how they recruit their employees.

This being a major problem with the acceptance of any casual work

And has been an issue for at least 35 years that I know of.

Surely you cannot expect the company to be adversely affected by the size/circumstances of an employees family and the size of the tax credits they receive? A job is worth an amount of money e.g. living wage as a minimum you surely don't expect a firm to pay a single person the living wage and a family man twice that amount for the same job?

The amount of corporation tax the company pays would be reduced through lower profits.

Should the employer also have to pay the employers NI on this additional figure too?

No, I expect employers to pay a wage that doesn't require any taxpayer-funded subsidy. Just remember, an employer who hands over a wage packet that is based on NMW is in reality saying: "I'd love to pay you less but the law won't allow me"

Similarly, I expect landlords to charge rents that don't require the taxpayer to subsidise them too

It is possible for a person or family to qualify for working tax credits where one of them is in full time employment on NMW, if they have qualifying children then they'll definitely qualify - you need to put the numbers through the online calculator though as there is a minefield of "what if's".

They're a business. What do people expect?