The National Police has carried out two operations against human trafficking for labor exploitation that have resulted in three arrests.
Article continues below
One in a car wash in Alicante, where the operators charged 4 euros an hour working every day of the week, and the other two in a vegetable company in Callosa de Segura, in which the workers worked marathon days of up to 16 hours peeling onions in exchange for ten euros, which yields an average of 1.6 euros per hour, as reported by the Provincial Police.
The three people arrested, two men and a woman aged 32, 46 and 54, all Spanish, have been accused of separate crimes against the rights of workers, favoring illegal immigration and labor trafficking.
According to the National Police, those arrested had several people in their companies in working conditions well below the minimum legally guaranteed, abusing their situation of vulnerability as immigrants who do not speak the language and are unaware of their rights. Most of the foreign workers lacked an employment contract, accident insurance, and residence and work permits.
Group III of the Unit Against Illegal Immigration Networks and False Documents (UCRIF) of the Alicante Provincial Immigration and Borders Brigade has been in charge of carrying out the two investigations against the labor exploitation of foreign citizens. The UCRIF agents collected the necessary data to proceed to the exploitation phase and went to the companies accompanied by personnel from the Alicante Labor Inspection.
The two cases uncovered by the National Police are equally bloody, but the employment situation of foreign workers in a company dedicated to the collection and distribution of vegetables in Callosa de Segura is striking.
The investigators located 16 workers in the inspection of said company , all of foreign nationality, and nine of them were in an irregular situation in Spain.
According to the data collected by the Police from the workers themselves, the immigrants were exploited without respecting the most elementary regulations on occupational hazards and carried out marathon days from six in the morning to ten at night . The working day was continuous and they did not rest even to eat.
Their main job was to peel onions and they were paid a salary based on the work done, at the rate of five euro cents for each kilogram of clean vegetables.
Therefore, they had to reach the amount of 200 kilos to collect the amount of 10 euros, which represents an average of 1.6 euros per hour, says the National Police.
The agents arrested a man and a woman as responsible for labor exploitation and proceedings were processed that were sent to the corresponding court in Vega Baja.
The second company inspected was a car wash and six workers were located there, five of whom were foreigners and two of them in an irregular situation.
According to the Police, the owner of the company was arrested, forcing all of them to work every day of the week, from Monday to Sunday, because if they fell ill and could not go to work they were not paid.
All this in exchange for a salary of 140 euros per week, for which they received an average of four euros for each hour of work. ■