Local Focus: Masterton dairy owner speaks up on lack of safety

Spare a thought for our dairy owners.

Masterton Hospital Foodmarket owner, Rajesh Patel, reckons day by day, the safety of dairy workers is headed downhill.

Patel has been running the food market since 2005.

Two years earlier, his family moved to New Zealand from India after his sister married here.

He has detected an exodus of dairy owners, many choosing to leave the country.

“It is a lovely country, good country, clean country. We love it [here],” Patel said.

“I would like to stay here.”

He says he knows five friends who have moved to the United States, and he says other families have packed up shop to go to Australia.

Following the stabbing of dairy worker Janek Patel in Auckland last month, Patel has growing safety concerns.

“We don’t know when [attackers are] going to be coming, which day, which time,” he said.

“It’s safety-wise no good, and if you think about economical-wise, that is also struggling. It is stressful.”

While statistics show youth crime is dropping, the focus on ram raids has led the government to invest a further $4000 per dairy in its fog cannon scheme. But Patel says it’s not enough.

“I think they need to look where it started, and where it needs to be looked after,” he said.

Patel wants to see parents held accountable for youth offending, citing 12 to 18-year-old offenders as a concern.

“Think about their parents, what they were doing, why did they leave them alone?

“If [parents] are not saying anything to [their children], then if they are doing something, better to charge [the parents].”

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has said that ram raid incidents decreased in November, but Patel said that misses the point of increasing occurrences over time.

“If you think about 2018 to 2022, then the difference has gone up 500 per cent.”

Patel says his business has been hit hard by rising food and commodity prices, as well as limitations on the sale of vaping products.

“Day by day, the price is going up and up and up” after Covid lockdowns, he said.

“When the smoke price started [rising], everyone started blaming us in place of thinking that it is the company’s decision, from upper levels. We have to follow that… we have to change the price.”

Patel says it’s the dairy owners who often find themselves in the firing line of customers, sometimes facing racial abuse to “go back to your country”.

“That sort of comment, it’s quite sad when we have to hear this.”

On top of the dangers of managing a dairy, Patel knows first hand the exhaustion of working 14 hour days with no time off.

“We are also human,” he said.

“Definitely it is possible that we are going to be getting tired too, we are going to be getting sick, too.

“And if you are doing that many hours on the same spot, seven days, [over the] whole year, it is quite depressing as well.

“We are not spending enough time with our own family.”

And while these businesses play a vital role in the community, decreasing profits, combined with increased costs of living are cause for concern for many owners.

“Now the interest rate is going up, with this income going down and living costs going up. That difference is quite heavy… this is stressful.”

Patel would appreciate more compassion from the community.

“If you get depressed by small things, think about the dairy owner’s life,” he said.

“Seven days here, [owners] can’t spend much time with their family.

“They are here all the time for the community.

“Think about Covid times also. If we are in the shop, do you think my parents, mum or dad, my wife, my daughter, are feeling safe if I’m working in Covid times? Definitely not.

“Everyone’s feelings about their loved ones are exactly the same. We need some love too.”