Working hard; hardly working

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In her speech on the steps of Downing Street on 13 July 2016, the new Prime Minister, Theresa May wanted to 'make Britain a country that works for everyone'. She recognised that if 'you're from an ordinary working class family, life is much harder than many people in Westminster realise'. She continued 'You have a job but you don't always have job security. You have your own home, but you worry about paying a mortgage. You can just about manage but you worry about the cost of living and getting your kids into a good school.' In her view, controlling immigration is one part of the answer but so are employment rights. My research project is about examining these two dimensions of her agenda. The research will span a number of topics looking at the past, the present and the future. The future I would first like to identify and explore labour clauses in the EU's other free trade agreements and to look as well at the mechanism of their enforcement. I would also like to examine other FTAs agreed with, for example, Canada, Australia and New Zealand to see how they manage the labour right issue. I would like to look at the interface between the movement of natural and legal persons and specifically how these agreements deal with posted workers (ie workers sent temporarily to do work in other States while retaining their employment connection with the home state). What labour rights do they have and what is their position under social security law and tax law?The presentThe Taylor review and the Good Work Plan rightly place considerable emphasis on enforcement. Any simplification of schemes for enforcing rights would help EU migrants and low paid domestic workers too. There is no labour inspectorate in the UK. Instead there are four agencies: HSE, HMRC, Employment Agency Standards Inspectorate, and the Gangmasters and Labour Abuse Authority. However, the combined work of these agencies is partial and, research suggests, at times ineffectiveThe pastThere are three strands of this enquiry. First, EU migrants in the UK on Brexit day will be entitled to apply for 'Settled' or 'Pre-settled' status. How is this system working in practice? To what extent are those individuals enforcing their employment rights? And to what extent are they experiencing discrimination, especially in terms of race (race, in the UK, includes nationality discrimination) and to what extent are they affected by the race pay gap? Secondly, I would like to explore the impact of putting immigration on the agenda and in the media, on race discrimination - both the experience of workers from a BME background and the number of claims brought. Has Brexit increased the prevalence of race discrimination and specifically, the number and kind of claims brought? Has it affected how non-EU migrants are viewed, even those British workers but from a BME background?Thirdly, I would like to look at the end of the old free movement regime. Specifically I should like to examineincluding what has happened to posted workers. I would like to look at the experience of those migrant workers in times of transition, working with a migrant advice centre in Great Yarmouth (http://www.gyros.org.uk/). What immigration problems are they experiencing at the moment? How is the transition to settled status affecting them? Does the Withdrawal Agreement create new principles of administrative law (such as a presumption of compliance and cases by case assessment) which may be rolled out across the immigration law regime? How are the judges making the new system work? Finally, I am acutely aware of the public engagement element of the project and the need to wrok closely with the director and his team which I have done over the last three years.