Seasonal migrant workers in Scottish agriculture: research report

Appendix F: Technical Annex

Ethical Considerations

The research team was prepared to handle any disclosure of illegal practices. This was to be handled in line with the latest Scottish Government's Trafficking and Exploitation Strategy. Police Scotland offers guidance to staff who are likely to encounter victims in the course of their work, this is a useful source.

From limited European-level research, there is evidence that migrant workers may under report crimes to the police. In research based on workers' perspectives (European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, 2019) more than half of the interviewees (57%) did not report their case to the police. The most common reason for not reporting it to the police (mentioned by a quarter of the interviewees) was being afraid or scared of, for example, losing their job, of being arrested and returned to their country of origin, or of generally getting into trouble. The second most frequent reason for not reporting to the police was a belief that 'the police would or could not help.' This European research emphasised the importance of support organisations in providing advice and information to workers, including reporting to appropriate public bodies.

Therefore, a document signposting resources such as websites and helplines was prepared for worker respondents.

Translation Plan

A translation plan was designed for this project to maximise responses of seasonal migrant worker. As agreed with Scottish Government, and based upon advice of the Research Advisory Group, the five languages were:

• Bulgarian
• Polish
• Romanian
• Russian
• Ukrainian

Evidence Review

The rapid evidence review drew on available information and data from the UK and the home-countries of seasonal migrant workers.

The evidence review looked at the following topics:

• the current landscape of agricultural seasonal migrant workers in Scotland,
• the legislative, regulatory and policy context in which the Scottish agricultural sector and its seasonal migrant workers sit (at a devolved, UK, and European level),
• the impacts of EU Exit on the above, and how it is expected to affect the workers and the industry in the long run,
• comparative examples in an international context,
• public perceptions of seasonal migrant workers (including for agriculture),
• insights on seasonal migrant workers, including demographics, families and transnational connections, economic and social mobility,
• prior research on their access to services and religious institutions, especially in rural areas,
• collation of intelligence and data from the Royal Scottish Agricultural Benevolent Institution (RSABI) and Scottish Government COVID-19 testing project of seasonal migrant workers,
• a review of economic data relating to the issue of migrant labour in Scotland.

Stakeholder Interviews

The discussion guides benefitted from review from the Research Advisory Group. Topics included:

• reflections on recruitment processes, wages, fair work principles, well-being and health of seasonal migrant agricultural workers,
• experience of COVID testing and regulations and EU Exit on the sector and its workers,
• views on how Scottish Government can positively engage with the industry to address concern and implement sustainable solutions,
• ideas for ways to put in a process for on-going data collection, monitoring and evaluation,
• views on incentivising high standards of working conditions,
• views on adding ethical treatment of workers to established recognition schemes,
• views on consumer behaviour and demand where relevant.

All interviews were fully transcribed and then coded in the qualitative software QDA Miner.

Employer Survey

The distribution sample was based on the Agricultural Census contact list and subject to a Data Sharing Agreement. For reasons of adhering to the data minimisation principle, Scottish Government released the distribution sample to Diffley Partnership as a third, then a second third and then a final third. Diffley Partnership monitored the achieved sample between these tranches. As such the survey was administered three times by Diffley Partnership until a sufficient sample was achieved. As such the survey was live for eight months from February to September 2022.

Members of the Research Advisory Group also supported the promotion of the survey to the sector. For example, a request went to the Horticultural Working Group and the survey was promoted within the National Farmers Union Scotland (NFUS). NFUS included an explanation and link within their e-newsletter; they also sent a survey link to the approximately 90 members on their database who employed seasonal migrant workers.

Analysis conducted included:

• Descriptive statistics, including frequencies, for the full sample (n=1089)
• Segmentation of the sub-sample who employed seasonal migrant workers in 2021 (n=38)
• Descriptive statistics, including frequencies, for the sub-sample (n=38)
• Analysis of text responses.

Worker Survey

The online worker survey was promoted in a number of different ways, including:

• News pieces and e-newsletters by RAG members
• Social media promotion by Scottish Government and stakeholders
• Sending posters to farms, charities and local business near farms. They included a QR code and the weblink to the survey and the privacy notice.
• Facebook and Twitter promotion, encouraging re-sharing by charities and businesses with which seasonal migrant workers may interact.

All of the promotional material was translated into the five languages agreed as part of the translation plan (see section 2.1).

Over the course of summer 2022 it was clear that the promotional attempts were not resulting in sufficient survey returns. Following discussions with sector stakeholders and employers, possible reasons included:

• Not all workers having access to Wi-Fi, data or smart phones.
• Multiple requests for seasonal migrant worker participation in research, audits and monitoring exercises by regulators and supermarkets.
• Cultural barriers, including distrust of government-backed exercises and data collection.

In order to address the low response rate and achieve as many high-quality responses as possible before the end of the 2022 season, Diffley Partnership proposed a change to the research approach to Drop and Collect. This necessitated:

• Approaching, liaising, and confirming farms to assist- taken from a combination of farms expressing willingness to help with further parts of the research in their employer survey and a list of the top 30 farms in terms of seasonal migrant worker employment provided by Scottish Government.
• Updating the survey to include three qualitative questions (Appendix C). This was to ensure the collection of qualitative information from workers prior to the end of the season.
• Printing surveys in sufficient volume for all languages.
• Printing signposting information, privacy notices for participants.
• Dropping off surveys at farms and the provision of tamper proof boxes with instructions for paper returns in all languages.
• Researcher picking up surveys from farms
• Manual data entry of paper surveys
• Manual scanning of text entry prior to translation
• Extra quality checking of paper survey responses
• An additional incentive per farm of a £50 Love2Shop voucher draw
• Provision of posters to each farm with the QR code and website in all languages, so that workers had another option to take part online.

Workers interviews

Professional interpretation and translation services were sub-contracted. These included:

• Translation of information for participants and privacy notice.
• Translation of initial approach email.
• Liaison with the workers in their own language to arrange an interview date and time within the working hours of the interpretation company and to suit the participant.
• Translation of the interview questions in advance to non-English language
• Translation of any clarification of details from participant to and back from research team member.
• During the interview posing the questions in non-English language
• Translation of responses back to English during the interview (this allows for researcher oversight and engagement).

Interviews were conducted as per the language preference of each participant. As a thank you for their time, participants were given the value of £20 by international bank transfer.

It was intended to interview twenty seasonal migrant workers of different ages and nationalities. Sampling achieved three participants (see table 2.2) resulting from:

• 21 Nov- 10 ideal sample and 15 replacements shared with the interpretation company- 7 invalid emails, 3 interviews were scheduled and 1 took place.
• 29 Nov- Additional 15 replacements shared with interpretation company- 3 invalid emails, 3 interview were scheduled and 2 took place.
• 7 Dec- Additional 42 replacements shared with interpretation company- 13 were invalid emails, 2 interviews were scheduled and 0 took place.