Feifei Hello and welcome to The English We Speak. I’m Feifei.
Roy And I’m Roy!
Feifei What are you doing? There are keys everywhere! What is that noise?
Roy Sorry, I was just cutting some keys! It turns out that I’ve been doing my job wrong all these years!
Feifei Ah! I know what happened. Neil called you to say you’re not a key worker, right?
Roy Exactly! All this time at the BBC and I hadn’t cut a single key! I’m lucky Neil was so forgiving. He had no idea what to say when I told him I’d start cutting keys.
Feifei I’m not surprised he didn’t know what to say! A key worker is someone who provides an essential service, like a doctor or nurse.
Roy Yep, that’s more logical. I get confused sometimes.
Feifei You do. Let’s listen to these examples while you get rid of those keys.
Examples My friends Jorge and Zdenka are both key workers! They do the amazing job of teaching kids.
Michiko is a key worker, but her class is closed at the moment due to the outbreak of the virus.
Key workers need to have easy access to their places of work during the coronavirus crisis.
Feifei This is The English We Speak from BBC Learning English and we’re talking about the expression ‘key worker’. This refers to a person who is seen to give an essential service or have an important role such as a teacher, doctor or nurse.
Roy That’s right! ‘Key’ in this expression relates to ‘vital’ or ‘important’. Not to keys that open locks.
Feifei Correct. And it’s been quite a common expression during the coronavirus pandemic. People have been talking about the importance of key workers being able to do their jobs during a world crisis.
Roy That’s right. In fact, I could say it’s been a key point of discussion. I really respect the amazing jobs that people like doctors, nurses, emergency service staff and teachers do.
Feifei Yes, me too. One thing though, Roy… How much did you spend on that key-cutting machine?
Roy Enough to say ‘please don’t tell my wife – she’ll be really angry’. Do you want me to cut you a new key?
Feifei No. I don’t want to encourage you! Bye, Roy.
Roy Bye!