The £2 an hour migrant workers

FOREIGN workers are pricing out British builders by working for as little as £2-an-hour, the Daily Express can reveal today.

Protesters at Lindsey Oil Refinery earlier this month Protesters at Lindsey Oil Refinery earlier this month

Desperate migrants – often in the country illegally – are asking just £25 for a 12-hour shift, undercutting British tradesmen who are struggling to find work.

The economic downturn has seen a sharp drop in demand for builders and it is feared immigrants prepared to work on such low rates will take many of the jobs that remain.

Yesterday one Romanian labourer told the Daily Express: “We will work all day for £25. The money is not right but we’ve not had any work for days and we’ve no money.”

Last night the Government was accused of letting down UK workers by allowing an immigration “free for all”. 

Foreign workers are pricing out British builders by working for as little as 2 an hour Foreign workers are pricing out British builders by working for as little as £2-an-hour

Tory MP Philip Davies said: “It’s understand-able that British workers, who pay tax and national insurance are getting increasingly frustrated when they are being undercut by migrants working illegally.

"They cannot compete with these rates.

“It’s a recipe for disaster which has real potential for further protests and unrest. This is why it is so important that we have control over our borders so we can allow only the number of people in that we need at any one time and stop this free for all.”

No one should work in this country for below the minimum wage, and employers who pay these wages should be caught and prosecuted

Tory immigration spokesman Damian Green

Tradesman Radini Caushillari, who runs Plastering London Ltd, said: “This is no good for anybody.

"My rates are £140 per day plus tax. But if these men are working for just £40 a day or less then they will take work away from registered workers.”

Tory immigration spokesman Damian Green said: “No one should work in this country for below the minimum wage, and employers who pay these wages should be caught and prosecuted.

“That’s why the Conservatives propose a specialist border police to stop this illegal use of immigrant labour.”

Stephen Alambritis, spokesman for the Federation of Small Businesses, urged ministers and law enforcement agencies to intervene.

He said: “We would urge foreign workers not to go over the top with their pricing as it makes a mockery of the national minimum wage. Foreign workers must respect our laws.”

Hundreds of foreign craftsmen line the streets of London before dawn every morning touting for work in Britain’s once booming building trade.

Those who are offered work accept as little as £25 for a 12-hour day – little more than a third of the £5.73 minimum wage.

The migrant workers, mostly from Romania, Bulgaria and Albania, also work cash-in-hand to avoid paying any tax or national insurance.

Romanian plaster Claudio Roman told the Daily Express: “British workmen are paid £110 a day but we work for £60.

“Now there is no work we must work for less. Most of the time people take work for £40 a day – plasterer, electrician, bricklayer – but some take even less.”

Some workers are registered with the Home Office and have told how they had done well out of Britain’s building industry.

But now they are struggling to work more than one day a week due to the dramatic effects that the credit crunch has had on house building.

Claudio, 21, said: “I came to Britain in 2007 and I found a job straight away. But now I get work one or two days a week. It is very bad. Many people have gone back home to Romania but it is even worse there.”

He is one of up to 100 migrant workers who stand on a street corner in Cricklewood, north-west London, every morning waiting for British builders to offer them work.

In other parts of the country migrant workers are even pestering local tradesmen and home owners buying supplies at DIY stores.

At Wickes in Seven Sisters Road, Tottenham, north London security guards have had to be called in to stop Eastern European labourers harassing their customers.

One, a Bulgarian man in his 40s called Ivo, had even printed his own flyer, written in faltering English.

It read: “If you are looking (sic) for to crack concrete, to built (sic) a wall, wall-paper (sic), painter, plaster, kitchens, bathrooms, you can contact with (sic) Ivo”.

A UK Border Agency spokesman said: “Abuse of the UK’s immigration system will not be tolerated.

“We are cracking down on illegal working because it leads to the exploitation of vulnerable workers and undercuts honest UK businesses.

"Dodgy bosses will have their premises raided and could face a fine of up to £10,000 per illegal worker they hire.”

Last month workers at the Lindsey Oil Refinery, near Grimsby, walked out in protest at the use of Italian and Portuguese contractors at the site run by oil giant Total.

The walkouts led to a series of wild-cat strikes by 5,000 workers at refineries and energy companies across the country.

Total has since said it would create extra jobs for British workers.

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