Seasonal workers from Nepal are shocked by notices they received that will end their contracts in the United Kingdom much earlier than agreed.
The British Home Office apparently changed the costing system for foreign-hired staff six weeks before the start of the soft fruit season, which relies heavily on this seasonal labor. This means they were paid a higher hourly rate than local workers for the same job. Farmers reportedly said this is a post-Brexit attempt to discourage the use of foreign workers.
Many of the Nepalese fruit pickers borrowed money to take up the work. They now face the grim reality of having to pay back these loans, while their British contracts were not even halfway through, leaving them well short of the amounts promised.