YELENA – not her real name as she wished to remain anonymous – moved to Scotland last year to work for a strawberry farm in Perthshire.
The 38-year-old from Kazakhstan arrived with a small group of other seasonal workers in April 2025, just ahead of the hectic soft fruit picking season.
The hope was to make some extra money and perhaps travel. But when she arrived at her home on the farm for up to six months – a caravan parked beside railway tracks – the reality was far removed from what she had imagined.
“The living conditions were poor,” she told The National. “It was damp and dirty, and the sofas were covered in layers of dirt.”
A video she shared with The National showed the carpets caked in mud (below).
Shared with 5 other workers, packed like sardines – each paid the farm £75 a week in rent, adding up to over £1800 a month for the cramped caravan. Another £20 a week roughly went towards electricity and gas. To save money, they avoided using heating wherever possible.
“You turn on the gas while cooking just to warm the caravan,” she said. “After eating, you go straight to bed before it gets cold.”
Yelena isn’t alone when it comes to these squalid living conditions.
The seasonal worker visa scheme was introduced in 2019 to fill labour shortages created by Brexit, after the departure of thousands of European workers who had traditionally travelled to the UK for harvest seasons.
Today, many workers arrive from countries including Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Ukraine on six-month visas to prop up the hundreds of farms across Scotland growing world class strawberries, raspberries and blueberries – contributing to a sector worth an estimated £188 million to the Scottish economy.
But labour rights organisations have repeatedly warned that the structure of the visa leaves workers vulnerable to exploitation.
A new report last month from the Worker Support Centre (WSC) – a Scottish Government-backed charity supporting migrant workers – described poor accommodation standards as widespread across the sector.
In 2025, 79 workers told WSC that they were living in squalid conditions, including freezing cold, damp, mouldy and unsafe accommodation.
This included two workers in their 30s from central Asia who told The National similar stories to Yelena, including cramped, mouldy caravans and little willingness from farms to improve living conditions.
“The mould was everywhere: on walls, ceiling, mattresses, beds. The carpet in the kitchen was terribly dirty and impossible to clean easily,” one of them said (images below).
“The sofa was also dirty, so you couldn't sit.”
The other worker also spoke of the isolation involved, with the caravans typically on site at the farm and far from any local towns – with limited transport options too.
With this in mind, he added: “These caravans are not worth the amount of money we pay, and the rent for them increases every year. It’s not very affordable or comfortable for us to live there. The sofas are small and the mattresses are very poor quality.”
Many more won’t come forward with complaints due to fears it may impact their employment and, ultimately, may lead to homelessness.
Research by WSC has found that seasonal agricultural workers in Scotland are especially legally precarious given housing is more often than not tied to their employment and, in practice, falls outside meaningful legal protection.
Because that accommodation is provided as part of the job, workers are often treated not as tenants with secure occupancy rights. This means they can lack the same protection from eviction without a court process, minimum notice periods or stronger rights to challenge unsafe or overcrowded conditions,
In other words, it creates a form of extreme dependence – if a worker loses employment, they can simultaneously lose both income and housing.
Last November, Scotland’s then Housing Secretary Mairi McAllan pledged to introduce national accommodation standards for seasonal workers. But with a new parliamentary term now under way, campaigners say questions remain over when – and if – those commitments will properly materialise.
Caroline Robinson, the executive director for the WSC, told The National: “Farm workers urgently need to see a timetable from this government for national standards to guarantee safe and warm homes for those who are working in difficult conditions to keep food on our tables.”
In response, a Scottish Government spokesperson said: “Seasonal workers make a valuable contribution to Scotland, in particular to soft fruit and horticultural businesses, and we are seeking to ensure that standards are in place for all seasonal worker accommodation.
“The Scottish Government is exploring further work with stakeholders on how that can be best achieved.”
Meanwhile, workers continue arriving for another harvest season picking the juicy world-class strawberries and raspberries that end up in punnets on the aisles of your local supermarket.
Yelena won’t return this year.
She – and others – complained about the conditions. She still remembers the restless nights – how the caravan shaked as trains passed, a particular annoyance at midnight and then again at 6am every day.
Or “constantly” drinking expectorant syrups due to the damp and mould and fears it would affect her health.
“[But] they make a note of the complaints,” Yelena said. “And don’t invite you to work next year, like in my case.”
Not that she would anyway.
Of the five workers who all arrived together last year, she said only one was invited back for the 2026 season.
NFU Scotland didn’t respond to a request for comment.
.
