"‘The job is not human’: UK retail warehouse staff describe gruelling work", 25. January 2023

As Amazon workers strike for first time, TUC says rapid home delivery relies on labour that is monitored, repetitive and demanding

This week’s strike at an Amazon depot in Coventry is throwing the spotlight on to a hidden army of workers in the UK’s retail sector, many of whom face “particularly gruelling” conditions, according to recent research commissioned by the TUC.

Five academics at the Centre for Research on Employment and Work (Crew) at the University of Greenwich analysed data about the retail workforce during and after the Covid pandemic, and carried out in-depth interviews with 30 workers.

They found that the pandemic “intensified existing trends” in online shopping, which meant a renewed shift from traditional shop-floor jobs towards work in warehouses, away from direct contact with customers.

The analysis suggests these warehouse roles often provide more regular hours, and that competition for staff has pushed up wage rates – but some interviewees said they found the jobs extremely demanding.

“Warehouse work was considered by research participants as particularly gruelling (‘the job is not human’),” the authors say in a summary of their findings, adding that there was “a suggestion that automation and robotisation might be necessary to save the cost to human physical and mental health”.

The TUC’s deputy general secretary, Kate Bell, said it was easy for consumers to forget that what feels like the “miracle” of rapid home delivery relies on “real human labour, and real human labour which is increasingly tough – monitored, repetitive, gruelling”. [...]

High-profile companies including Sports Direct have come under fire over the conditions faced by workers in their warehouses. The fashion retailer Boohoo recently rejected claims made in the Times that staff could walk 13 miles in a single shift, in sweltering temperatures. [...]

The researchers suggest surveillance of staff is used differently in workplaces where unions have a seat around the table. “Where trade unions are recognised, workplace representatives play a key role in mediating technology and constraining its use in disciplinary measures against workers,” the report says. [...]

The TUC is calling for collective bargaining across the retail sector, including in distribution, to strike standard-setting “fair pay agreements”, and a right for employees to be consulted before new technologies are introduced.

When challenged about staff discontent, Amazon, which refuses to recognise unions, pointed to a recent increase in starting pay, to “a minimum of between £10.50 and £11.45 per hour”, and what it called “a comprehensive benefits package” worth thousands of pounds. But the TUC’s Bell, welcoming this week’s strike action, said: “What these people need first is a voice in their own workplace.” [...]