Employers fleecing their workers is nothing new

Dec 25, 2017 Letters

Dear Editor,
I read the recent letter about employers fleecing their workers. In the past, employers from abroad did this in a big way, and their exploited workers were unaware of this.In the mid-1970s, in between permanent jobs, I had an agency placement in the Finance section of a nearby worldwide chocolate family firm. It was an eye-opener. Their servants got nothing near what the firm had earmarked and sent for them. The money intended for, say, three servants were used to employ four or more, servants overworked and underpaid. This became the norm.
I recalled, as a child, learning to crochet and knit (my mother was a champion at both) and I sometimes copied patterns from notebooks borrowed from her friends. These women, many of them Carnegie-trained, competent and reliable, were snapped up by British staff – unaware that they were being exploited, but feeling privileged to be working for ‘white people.’ They were treated with courtesy by “the mistress”, and they seldom changed jobs and forever remained my mother’s friends.
I felt fortunate to have seen both sides of the domestic picture. Recently, when speaking with a high school friend from the mid1940s, she told me that I ought to consider writing a book on my various experiences through life, good and bad, others might benefit.
A sort of psalm!
Geralda D

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