‘We wipe arses and make cups of tea’: intersectionality of gender, race, and migration status in the devaluation of feminized care labour in England

This study integrates feminist labour theory, affective labour and ethics of care within an intersectional lens to examine the intersecting inequalities of gender, race and migration status that shape experiences of women working in domiciliary care (care at home) in England. We conducted semi-structured interviews with 18 care workers from migrant and White British backgrounds. The key findings highlight feminized labour conditions including gendered care work, contractual and training precarity, shared across migrant and non-migrant participants, while challenges of interpersonal racism and institutional racism, were exclusively reported by migrant women, underscoring the intersectional layering of inequality within domiciliary care. The findings reveal that women are positioned as ‘natural’ carers, dismissed as low-skilled, and allocated the most demanding tasks, often linked to visible markers of race, alongside insecure employment arrangements, non-standardized and unpaid training, and limited opportunities for progression. The article contributes to debates on the devaluation of feminized labour by showing how power operates through institutional and everyday labour practices, and by demonstrating the need to address the structural inequalities that shape the lives of migrant and racialized women in the care workforce.