By Aaron Barbour
It’s great to see the Employment Agency Standards at the government department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (BERR) actively promoting their services in our area of east London. They work best through referrals at a local level.
Their latest campaign focuses on knowing your rights as an agency worker. They’re getting the tone right in their posters (see left) and leaflets. This contrasts to the agressive and puntative tone taken by DWP over recent years – see previous blog post.
We’ve been meeting various enforcement agencies over the last couple of months in connection with our informal economy work. Their resounding message is: “we’re massively under-resourced, but we’re here to help where we can to reduce accidents in the work place, enforce the minimum wage, and help those who aren’t sure of their legal duties when running an employment agency.”
For example, the Employment Agency Standards recently doubled their number of officers – and have just hit double figures … for the whole country! Shouldn’t this be raised up the government’s list of priorities in terms of resources (budget and staff), particularly in these hard times with increasing levels of informal paid work? Or do we have to wait for another Morecambe Bay tragedy before any action is taken?
