The physicality of worthlessness: a tool for addressing the undervaluing of care workers employment since the pandemic?

In this paper I show how undervaluing of care work in law gives rise to exposure to physical harms in working life. I term this observation, ‘the physicality of worthlessness’. At an extreme, the ‘physicality of worthlessness’ cost care workers their lives during the pandemic and has damaged the health of tens of thousands more because of inadequate protection at work. In the maelstrom of 2020, it felt possible that the pandemic crisis would precipitate a political moment in which the pre-existing crisis of care and its associated undervaluing of care work might be addressed. There were widespread calls for a fundamental rethink of care workers’ pay and conditions. However, in the months and years that have followed, the subordinated status of care workers has been affirmed and deepened by the UK Courts and government, including the removal of minimum wage entitlements, denial of protection for taking industrial action, and welfare reforms that enable the removal of 100% welfare support for refusing to accept any offer of a low-wage, zero-hours and insecure care job. My account of the physicality of worthlessness reveals a standalone injustice, one that is evident as harmful without need for comparison to a non-care work, or male, standard. The denial of rights has physical effects on care workers, including physical exploitation, unprecedented physical control, detriment to health, risk to life, and it also facilitates encounters with racist abuse, sexual harassment and physical violence at work. By drawing attention to the physicality of worthlessness, I highlight a route through which injustices of law and public policy can be challenged for reasons other than status inequality between care workers and those who are not care workers. It offers a potential intellectual platform from which to campaign for urgently needed changes in law and public policy.