13. Migrant workers taking action
This pathway is especially suited to migrant workers who want to get involved but have limited time or capacity for formal roles. It can also be a stepping stone towards becoming a steward or taking other leadership positions.
Active Members play a key role in tackling problems that disproportionately affect migrant workers, such as those addressed in this guide. By building collective power in the workplace, Active Members can help secure better pay, conditions, and respect for all workers while also strengthening migrant workers’ visibility and voice within UNISON.
Case study: becoming an Active Member – Omotola’ s story
Omotola( not real name) is a domiciliary care worker in Cardiff, she’ s been in the country and worked for a company for three years after coming as a dependent on her husband’ s visa. She’ s looking forwards to leaving that employer after another two years when she can apply for leave to remain. Like many migrant workers in the care sector, she faces long hours, low pay, and constant stress. She is also a mother of two, balancing family responsibilities with exhausting work.
“ Basically, we have no time for the children. We have no time for husbands. We’ re on the road from morning till night, working all day for 48 hours in a week, and we still sacrifice because our off days.”
Her work would often send her on a long 50-minute drive to Bridgend from Cardiff multiple times a day instead of arranging a rota so she could stay in one area. She’ d leave the house at 6.30am and not be back until midnight.“ So many times I was crying while I was driving. But that is the sacrifice I have to pay for my children if I want them to remain in this country, so I learned to stop crying. I stopped crying and I stopped complaining. I just want to enjoy the work with the clients. The clients are nice people.”
Her company pays mileage for travel between visits, but there is no transparency in how the payments are calculated.“ We don’ t really know how it’ s worked out. You get something, but you can’ t challenge it or understand if it’ s fair. And when you’ re already underpaid, every penny matters.”
She had been a UNISON member for a while but inactive. This changed when she got a call from an organiser encouraging her to get more involved:“ I joined online, and within a short time a local organiser phoned me. We talked openly about the issues we’ re facing, and we mapped out my workplace. We agreed on who to speak to, and how we could get more of my colleagues into UNISON so that we could start to build our power.”
76 LRD • Supporting migrant workers