For the second day in a row, pictures of people crammed onto the London Underground have raised questions about the effectiveness of the government’s latest coronavirus advice issued amid an unprecedented lockdown of the UK.
Just hours after Boris Johnson told all Brits to travel to and from work only “where it is absolutely necessary”, pictures circulated on social media showed social-distancing rules being seemingly thrown out the window during Tuesday’s commute.
While many are no doubt key workers such as NHS staff, many of those working on the multitude of construction sites in the capital have also been forced to travel to work.
Trade unionist Dan Dobson told HuffPost UK: “Over a million working in the construction industry are registered as self-employed. At the moment as it stands, there is no support from the government for any of those people.
“If they were to stay at home they would have no income to pay their rent or general household bills. Until the government bring in protections for those self-employed, then they’re not going to have a choice.”
Unite union boss Len McCluskey said on Tuesday that many workers were simply confused about the government guidance.
He said: “The prime minister has asked us all to play our part in the enormous national effort to save lives and beat the Covid-19 virus.
“But the stark reality is that millions of workers are confused about whether or not they can or should be at work.”
Housing secretary Robert Jenrick said on Monday night that work on building sites can continue, but workers should practise social distancing.
But Dobson says this is near impossible: “The issue is having people working safely on sites. Canteen facilities for example. A site may have 1,700 people working on it but they won’t have 1,700 chairs in the canteen – they’ll have a couple of hundred.”
Construction workers told the PA news agency that, although they are scared of catching the virus and taking it home to their families, they are reporting for work because otherwise they will not get paid and risk losing their jobs.
A crane operator at a London construction site with 400 to 500 workers said: “Everyone on site at the minute feels angry and unprotected.”
He said staff have been given no guidance on what was happening other than “just carry on until told otherwise”.
Dobson said there are three things that need to happen to ease the pressure on construction workers: “Shut the sites, sort how self-employed people are meant to live if they’ve got nowhere to go to work, and [designate] sites that are critical – not critical for the economy, but maybe a hospital being finished or a facility to make ventilators.”
Labour MP David Lammy described reports of workers going in on Tuesday morning as “very troubling” and called for construction sites to be closed down.
In a tweet, he said: “Reports of non-essential workers going in this morning are very troubling.
“Government needs to shut down construction sites and make sure other non-essential work is not happening – and urgently provide financial support for the self-employed.
“We must lockdown to save lives.”
On Tuesday afternoon, Transport for London (TfL) announced work on Crossrail sites is being temporarily suspended to limit the spread of coronavirus.
All work on TfL and Crossrail sites will be stopped unless they “need to continue for operational safety reasons”.
Housebuilder Taylor Wimpey also said it has closed its construction sites, show homes and sale sites due to coronavirus, PA Media reports.
The company added: “In the interest of customer and employee safety, we have taken the decision to close all of our show homes, sales centres, and construction sites for all work except that needed to make the sites safe and secure.”
But earlier on Tuesday, rival Redrow said its sites remain open with “strict precautions in place including enhanced levels of cleaning, additional hygiene facilities and social distancing”.