Key Workers in the Capital - One year in London

This report from RSA and funded by Trust for London looks at how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted key workers in London.

Through the last 12 months, the UK has faced two distinct and deadly waves of Coronavirus. The effect on London has been highly acute: successive lockdowns have caused decline for much of the London economy, particularly in the centre, where a high proportion of jobs and businesses are in industries face trading restrictions associated with lockdown: retail, hospitality, entertainment, and culture. It can be easy to think of key workers as standing apart from these wider troubles, but there are still significant numbers of London’s key workers who are also suffering from poor economic security.

1. London’s key workers are split in their finances and their economic outlook. Some are comfortable and optimistic while others are struggling and pessimistic about the future. 
2. Ethnic minority key workers nationally (14% of all key workers are from an ethnic minority background), many of whom live in London, are especially pessimistic about their economic future. 
3. Despite the Greater London rental market prices falling by 6.4% in the year to the fourth quarter of 2020, 23% of London’s renting key workers say their rent has increased. This shows the differing rental markets of inner and outer London (where rental changes have held flat), but could also show that key workers in London have felt their other housing costs to increase too. 
4. Key workers in London are also the most generally dissatisfied with their housing situation when compared to other regions.  
5. London key workers have had to sacrifice their personal lives for their work to a greater extent than key workers in Great Britain as a whole. London’s key workers were consistently the most likely to say they have found ‘maintaining their work-life’ balance and ‘taking leave when they want’ more difficult as a result of the pandemic.
6. London’s key workers are more likely to cite ‘money worries’ and the number of ‘people at work who have become very ill or died with coronavirus’ as drivers of poor mental health, compared to the rest of Great Britain. 
7. To help support key workers in the capital, the RSA is calling on the next Mayor of London to set a wider definition of ‘key worker’ when prioritising affordable housing, and promise to freeze Transport for London fares for key workers in the capital.