One in 10 shopworkers assaulted during pandemic

Nearly one in 10 shopworkers in the East of England have been assaulted by customers.

That's according to latest research from the shopworkers' union - which is asking us to respect our retail workers.

More than three quarters (76%) of shop workers say that incidents of violence, threats, and abuse have been worse during the coronavirus pandemic, according to new research from the Union of Shop, Distributive and Allied Workers (Usdaw).

In fact, 85% have experienced verbal abuse, 57% have been threatened by a customer, and almost one in ten (9%) have been assaulted so far this year.

This has been revealed on the launch of Respect for Shopworkers Week (16th - 22nd November), looking to raise awareness of the year-round Freedom from Fear campaign and promote the parliamentary petition calling for Government to create legislation to protect shopworkers which has almost 70,000 signatures.

Doug Russell from the union says there's been more cases of people being attacked since the pandemic began.

He said:

"We've done a survey of a couple of thousand shopworkers over the last few weeks and 85% of them said they'd had verbal abuse in the last few weeks and nearly one in 10 of them said they had been physically attacked, which is quite a shocking figure.

"What's really shocking this year is the levels of violence have nearly doubled as a result of the pandemic, especially when shopworkers have been reminding people about social distancing and wearing masks."

• retail
• covid-19