Glastonbury festival responds to ‘zero-hours’ contract criticism

Glastonbury faced accusations of exploiting foreign workers this week after The Independent published findings that the festival sacked around 600 employees after two days. It was said they had travelled to the country expecting two weeks of paid work.

Jeremy Corbyn, who made a high-profile appearance at the festival, was among the critics, with a spokesman saying: “In terms of employment contracts, those contracts should not be taking place and we are opposed to them and when we are next in Government we will outlaw them. We’ve made quite clear we are opposed to those forms of contract everywhere.”

Glastonbury has now responded to criticism in a statement: "In response to recent stories in the media, we would like to state that Glastonbury festival’s post-event litter picking team are all given temporary worker agreements for the duration of the clean-up.

"As well as being paid, they are provided with free meals and access to on-site facilities. The length of the clean-up varies considerably from year to year, based largely upon the weather conditions before, during and after the festival.

“This is something the litter pickers - many of whom return year after year - are made aware of in their worker agreements (which assure them of a minimum of eight hours’ work).

"This year was an unusually dry one for Glastonbury. That, coupled with a fantastic effort from festival goers in taking their belongings home, meant that the bulk of the litter picking work was completed after 2.5 days (in 2016, a very wet year, the equivalent period was around 10 days).

"All but a core crew of litter pickers were advised that there was no further work available after Friday (June 30). Those who weren’t able to leave the site over the weekend were given further meals, plus assistance with travel to nearby towns with public transport links.

"We’d like to thank the litter pickers for their work on the clean-up, which was - as always - hugely valued by the festival."

[Via: The Independent]

Patrick Hinton is Mixmag's Digital Staff Writer, follow him on Twitter