Ten to one a.m. This was when Imre Vékony was woken by his alarm clock. After this he collected his colleagues who could catch a little extra sleep before they all set off to their workplace 130 kilometres away. Melinda Marsi could sleep until 1.00 a.m. and some of the others could stay in bed until 1.15 a.m. They appreciated Imre's consideration as it was enough for them to run out to the bus and set off at 1.45 and they did not have to wait around by the road. After all, it would not be decent for married women with children to stand around by the road.

The town of white vans

Little groups gathering on the road well before dawn and waiting for the "transit" is a common and usual sight in the town. The name comes from the fact that the workers usually use 9- or 12- seater, battered Ford Transit vans. Sándor Lévai, the deputy-mayor of Mezőtúr, says that he alone knows around two hundred people from the town who commute to Budapest, Debrecen, Kecskemét and Szolnok to work on construction sites, slaughterhouses and assembly plants. Unemployment is above average in the region.    

Imre Vékony and his colleagues were heading towards Szeged-Szentmihály and travelled at least two hours to get to work at a poultry slaughterhouse. They had to arrive at the Szentmihály New Life Ltd. plant by 4.15 a.m. In accordance with EU stipulations on food and safety, the plant is hyper hygienic and since it is a poultry slaughterhouse, snow white boots, white trousers, overalls and white protective caps need to be worn. Nobody could say of them that they were working in the black economy.

But they all were. The ever-cheerful 57-year-old Imre Vékony, who was also the driver, 29-year-old Melinda Marsi, "the boss", who used to run a grocery shop and now was responsible for filling in the attendance sheet; Mihálné Sipos (53), who was known as a true fighter. 49-year-old Katalin Balogh Lajos Lázárné Gonda, who was the newest member of the established little group and happy to be among hard-working, good people. Istvánné Tiger, whose favourite topic of conversation  was cooking, 46-year-old Lajos Csikós, who loved life and came from a large family, and Erzsike  Ferencné Mloch, who was well known in the neighbouring town's chemist's and grocery shop, and whose neighbour, a lady of 85, wept as if she had lost her own daughter in the fatal crash.

Even the National Labour Inspectorate did not realise that the company employed workers illegally. They inspected the plant on several occasions but apart from some minor irregularities found everything to be in order. But there were betraying signs. Six out of the eight people involved in the accident were registered as job seekers, two of them received benefits from the local government and two others received the same from the state. The slaughterhouse where they worked hardly had any workers of its own, but used borrowed workers. This is not illegal but in Mezőtúr and its environs everybody knows what to suspect when a company's production is built solely on such workers.

The system of worker exchange is used in Western Europe if for example a company receives a large order and temporarily needs to supplement its workforce. However, there are quite a few employers in Hungary that do not actually have any employees. At least not officially. In reality, workers often stay with the same team in this unofficial way for long periods of time, being outsourced by different companies. This is how people end up being exploited on a third-world-level in an otherwise spic-and-span company that obeys EU regulations. And the exploited are even grateful for the work.

However, in order for the workplace to appear official in the eyes of the authorities at least two players are necessary. The first is the invoicer, i.e. an entrepreneur who owes no taxes because he has just set up his company with the express purpose of avoiding paying tax. In our case this invoicer is János Oláh, who in July 2009 established a co.ltd called Omega-Túr. This company was contracted to hire out workers which it legally employed - but these workers were anything but legal.

The invoicer needs to be changed after a while because within a few months it loses its "innocence" in tax affairs. After the tragedy Oláh requested immunity from the town's mayor saying: his only task was to signs papers at the end of the week, pick up the wages for the workers and take them to the "entrepreneur". This is the name of the second player in the business transaction whose name does not appear on any legal document; he operates the network. He generally pays ten percent of the income to the invoicer.

In our case Attila Rafael was the "entrepreneur". We were unable to find Rafael in the town, and his house in Gyomaendrőd did not look lived in. We tried to find him through his brother who told us that Rafael had lost his telephone and couldn't be reached.

Rafael paid his workers 400 forints per hour, which is less than the gross minimum wage. We were unable to find out how much he agreed on with the slaughterhouse and we were told by the CEO over the phone to leave the dead in peace. The only person out of the group who had a proper salary was Imre Vékony, who received 118 thousand forints a month in hand. The others took home one hundred thousand forints a month for four 12-14-hour days per week and four to five hours of daily travel.

Police raid

Skin colour does play a role in the unofficial model of worker exchange. Most of the exchanged workers (locally known as slaves) and the invoicer are not Gypsies, while the "entrepreneur" is. The fact that the companies in Mezőtúr went bankrupt one after the other shows how widespread this peculiar branch of business has become. It is said that the model has been developed to perfection in neighbouring Túrkeve.

The town has gained a name for itself because the Gypsies there are better off than the non-Roma Hungarians who are often employed by the Gypsies. However, a spanner was thrown into the works some weeks ago when the police swooped on several houses in Túrkeve to look for evidence against a tax evasion network woven over several settlements in Jász-Nagykun-Szolnok County.

This time the police were able to track down not only the invoicers but also the previously convicted "entrepreneurs" who directed the whole system from their orange or crimson coloured villa-like houses, outside of which stood luxury cars in splendidly kept gardens.  According to the authorities, the network extended over the whole county and had 1,800 exchange workers, who each received 300-350 forints of the 600 forints they were supposed to earn per hour.  

Born twice

Anita Marsi's life was saved by bureaucracy. On the day of the tragedy her husband was dealing with a property matter so she did not join the group. Apart from this everything took place as usual. The van left Mezőtúr at 2.00 a.m. and reached a farm between Szeged and Röszke by 4.15 a.m. The group quickly got changed so that everybody would be in their place by the time that the "live" conveyor belt - as they call the chicken gutting - started.

The chickens, which were strung up on hooks by their legs were knocked out by an electric current led into water, then a man forming part of another brigade cut their throats. Imre, the driver, had the task of tearing the heads off with one movement and to turn around the machine-plucked animals on the hooks with another. Mlochné and Tigerné dealt with the hearts and livers, while Anita's younger sister, Melinda and Siposné dealt with the gizzard, and the third lady had to get rid of the chickens' cloacae. The chicken gutting finished at 2.30 p.m., after which the legs were arranged on trays and the breast meat filleted. Imre, who by this time had worked 13 hours, was allowed to stop at this point, since two weeks earlier the drivers managed to negotiate a deal allowing them to rest a little before sitting behind the wheel again.     

- He was always up to his task, he never fell asleep while driving, said Imre Vékony's widow in black and his daughter, who almost tried to suggest that Imre could not have caused the accident. According to the police report the driver was proceeding along the main road on route 45 from Szentes to Kunszentmárton when he swerved onto the left lane and collided with an oncoming police bus. According to the family the autopsy report does not mention any illness and the van was in good technical condition.

Of the eight passengers in the Ford Transit six died immediately and one died while being taken to hospital. The cemetery where Imre Vékony was given his send off was covered with wreathes and he was also mourned by the relatives of the other victims and not blamed for the tragedy. Only one single passenger, Éva Pénzes, survived the crash and is no longer in a critical condition. She would normally be entitled to a 90 percent sickness benefit but since she was employed illegally she will receive nothing. The slaughterhouse gave one million forints to the families affected, and the local government contributed amounts ranging between 50-75 thousand forints towards their expenses.  

 -We knew, of course we knew that we were working illegally. But I didn't mind because at least I had work, said Anita Marsi. In January this year the town's job centre had 90 vacancies for 2,700 job seekers. Despite the economic crisis "the entrepreneurs" can still find work: every day two vans transport workers to the poultry processing plant from Mezőtúr alone. 

The tragedy has shocked the town, because there is not a street in it that does not see a Ford Transit turn up at dawn.