Got asked on site today by the site labourers if I wanted a hand or if I wanted help on private jobs, I gave them a short sharp answer, the labourers in question were of the eastern european variety, they had earlier been watching my mate fitting some carpet tiles, he as we do in that situation downed tools and played on the phone till they went on their merry way if ever asked we also feed them false info on money 40p a metre on carpet tiles is the going rate This got me thinking does anybody actually use eastern block labourers? or more to the point is anyone stupid enough to use them? as far as im concerned (and my mate) we dont let them have a sniff as if you were to teach them/let them work with you they would be after your job for less money as soon as they were half competent, now that is a generalisation but one that we have found to be true from listening to other trades on site with stories about stuff like that happening. What are your opinions lads?
I wouldn't employe as I know too many people that need the work but to be fair from what I've seen they are bloody hard workers. Problem is they work silly hours. The last school we did they was working all hours, sleeping in the classrooms and carry on first thing in the morning. Bit of a joke really.
where i stay there is hundreads of them i admire them almost all of them send most of their wages home to poland and lithuania to there familys dont think i would employ them though due to the above but as you say hard workers they put some of our workers to shame
Depends ive found like us, you get your good workers and you get your bad, some will be up and down moving gear all day others will skulk about doing as little as possible.
The place I work for has two guys from Croatia fitting wood and one from Poland fitting tiles,they are all excellent at their jobs,but most certainly don't work for peanuts. When I was working in London it was full of eastern Europeans,almost every site I went to,but at least it was always ready and clean for us to start,it was never the same when it was English builders.
Still is jam rolls everywhere, ive been on sites where its hard finding somebody who speaks english bar the site agents.
The builder I do wet rooms for has had a Russian bloke working for him for about 6 years. Top bloke and works hard. Always tidying up as I cut the room in. Dave said he'd rather have him they any of the English lads who works for him. He still can hardly speak English though.
Surely that should be an elf and safety issue on site if an operative cannot understand or comnunicate.
I never judge on nationality if they work hard that would be good enough for me, youve got to be reminded that they only want to better themselves give them a chance, unless we are sourcining the work ourselves its not our work so when i turn up on site i dont have a problem with other nationalitys working they are earning a crust just like anyone else.
I've not got a problem with foreigners working on site as labourers or working for the chippys etc more power to them. If I were in charge I wouldn't let the non English speaking ones on site but that's just me, what I won't do is put my self in a position where I can be undercut to the point where I can't do the job because the polish/whatever labourer I had with me for a few months has decided to go on his own and beat everyone on rates so that they get all the work, not on my watch, that might not apply to every foreign worker but I've heard of enough story's where that's happened to not let myself get in that situation.
