People clapped for heroes. I remember diving down a street in Carrickfergus one night in the course of my work during the pandemic with people standing at their front doors clapping, gesturing to me with clapping hands and waving at me. I waved back, just being polite. I’m no hero, am I? I’m sure if they knew my political outlook they would have seen me as less than a hero but they clapped for me anyhow. This gesture may have been viewed as a good idea at the time, but many of those it was aimed at would see it as more an insult in the future. I had been thinking about all this clapping and what it actually meant and am on record saying I wouldn’t accept it nor would I clap…”I have too much respect for key workers.” I had heard and witnessed the clapping every night for weeks and weeks and weeks. People were clapping yet in certain parts where I was delivering essentials, people who I had witnessed ‘clapping for heroes’ with my own eyes, were doing exactly the things they were being told not to, to keep everyone safe. The height of hypocrisy.
I work as a Home Delivery Driver for a well known chain store and have worked almost flat out throughout this pandemic in what has been the hardest working environment I’ve ever experienced. I work in a job which, before the pandemic was seen as a job not worthy of a proper wage and a job for the ‘lower classes’. I’ve heard retail jobs being described as being “not real jobs.” There are people I work with who possess Masters Degrees, who hold advanced driving licences and who have worked in higher paid jobs than being a cashier or a van driver, but due to their own circumstances have had to leave those jobs and take jobs in retail. Yet those very same, low wage, ‘lower class’ jobs dragged this country through a deadly pandemic and I’m only speaking of my own experiences in retail. There are many other sectors of low paid workers who are just as worthy of note.
That mindset was somewhat mirrored in the ‘Clap for Heroes’ gesture, when it very quickly changed to ‘Clap for the NHS’ which in my eyes was fair enough, but showed in the harsh light of day that those workers who kept the food flowing and kept the country running were being reduced to mere ‘shop workers’ again. While people were shouting about higher pay for nurses and medical staff, everyone else who had initially been deemed ‘heroes’ before, were forgotten…again. Store workers were being harassed, spat at, security colleagues were being attacked for asking people to keep their distance from the person in front of them and later for asking people to wear masks.
One experience which really hurt me personally, was during the really hot summer during the first lockdown. I was delivering to an address in Ballymena. I had started at 06:30am and wasn’t due to finish until 22:00 that night as we were on extended shifts due to lockdown, and it was only 14:00. The instructions on the delivery stated, “Covid positive delivery” which meant wearing two pairs of surgical gloves, two masks and washing your hands in very strong disinfectant before and after the delivery. During that delivery, my trolley carrying the delivery in crates tipped over, the 10-15 people in the front garden who were, by the way having a party and were all drunk, laughed and jeered at me while I was repacking the crates and then gave me dog’s abuse when I challenged them about the address being flagged Covid positive, yet they were having a party. A few commented about being on furlough and how they were having a great time while I was “sweating like a dog.”
What I always found strange was that people were surprised and outraged when nurses came out and said they were working 16 hour days during the pandemic yet there wasn’t a single thing said about the fact retail workers, especially in the likes of Home Shopping and driving teams specifically, were working 14-16 hour double shifts on a regular basis before the pandemic was even a ‘thing’, and thats no disrespect to nurses and medical staff who work extremely hard. What was becoming increasingly clear was that people simply expected retail and store workers to do what they do, just expected them to be there when they were needed and had no idea that the hours we were working before the pandemic, was what the public were now outraged about when it came to more ‘better thought of’ professions during the pandemic. It actually struck a nerve with some within the driving team who felt downright betrayed as while we were on standard 16 hour days for months during the lockdowns there was outrage that nurses were working longer hours. Our work load more than tripled per van and when vans broke down due to almost constant use, we were expected to pick up the slack of the broken down vans too.
I remember one of the drivers came in one day from his first run and was going to start loading up his second run. A few of us were having a ‘socially distanced natter’ in the loading area while our runs were being finalised, ‘shooting the shit’ as it were, and he came over and joined in. He started laughing then all of a sudden was in floods of tears. The pressure got to him and then another driver fell apart second later. In times like these, sometimes a dark sense of humour is the only way to get through some situations but sometimes the laughter at those jokes fades to realisation of the pressure and loss and the realistic situation. The loss of the customers we have lost to the virus, the loss of people we would deliver to every week, sometimes twice per week, customers we knew by name, loss of colleagues and friends we lost and all to the one virus, in a few short months.
To some, we were the only contact they had with the outside world. We would stand in the lashing rain talking to our elderly customers because we knew others couldn’t visit. If a son and daughter were to order groceries for their parents at another address, regularly we would take the other half to their parents even if we weren’t scheduled to take a delivery to that address. As one doctor I delivered to said – “When everyone else was told to run away from the danger, many were told to go run into it”, and they did so willingly.
The problem is, no one was ever asked to be hailed as some kind of hero. Everyone appreciated the clapping, but it quickly became clear the clapping would be seen by governments as an alternative to proper pay and while nurses and healthcare staff may have received a semblance of a pay rise – though nowhere near enough, those others who ran into the fire behind them, to make sure this country kept running, albeit slowly, received absolutely nothing even though we’re paid less than many of those who were also deemed ‘Key Workers’. I’ve heard nurses calling for key workers to be given a meaningful pay rise – the problem being, retail workers don’t work for the Government or the NHS which means unless the Government rises the minimum wage sufficiently or comes through with a decent living wage, those working in retail will be left behind again just as they have been in the past.
Initially, the pandemic was hailed by many as a point in time where the world could reset and fix problems like the massive widening gap between the minimum wage, the more well paid workforce and the rich, fixing the inequalities in society and making society work for everyone. However, what has actually happened is the rich have become richer and the poor have become poorer. People have actually been refusing to come off state benefits because they are being paid more while on benefits than when they were working…so who can blame them. If they’re being paid what governments think they actually need to live on, and its much more than what they’re being paid while working…something is severely wrong.
Ironically, many of those who were essential to keeping the country moving and functioning have been forgotten once again. A low paid, essential workforce, essential to keeping society functioning is paid pittance. Home Delivery Drivers who facilitated society being able to self isolate in the knowledge they could have essentials delivered straight to their front door if they were Covid positive or if they were waiting for a Covid test result or if they simply didn’t feel it was safe to go out. Workers who kept shelves stocked, drivers who moved the food and goods to and from stores, cleaners, refuse disposal and more…they were and still are Key Front line Workers.
Believe it or not, I’m immensely proud of the job I did throughout the pandemic and continue to do to this day. I may not be a doctor or a firefighter, a soldier or a vet but I did my part to carry this country through a pandemic and help others get through it too, through some very challenging episodes in my own personal life. I stepped up when people needed me to and I’ve never been more proud of the people I work with. They’re the salt of the earth, real everyday heroes…and we are the forgotten.Attachments area
Comments are closed.