Edinburgh Woollen Mill had contracts with the Tazreen Fashion factory in Bangladesh where a fire killed at least 112 workers. So did C&As
Bangladesh, the world's second-largest producer of clothes, has secured this position only by offering workers the lowest wages in the world and having some of the worst safety regulations in the industry. Before last week's disaster, more than 500 garment workers had died in fires and accidents since 2006. Land is at a premium in the country, and it is common for factories to have eight or nine floors. And although factories may have escape gates, owners often prefer to lock them, supposedly to stop staff stealing merchandise. In 2006, 65 workers died in a garment factory fire in the southern city of Chittagong after management ordered gates to be locked.
By most accounts, the Bangladesh tragedy could have been prevented by management simply spending more money on safety. Money for new fire extinguishers, money for more access, money for additional fire escapes, money for conducting regular evacuation drills, and money for old-fashioned fire prevention measures
"All these fires in Bangladesh, if you look at why so many die and are injured, in most cases it is because you find that the doors are locked," said a Bangladeshi architect, Bashirul Huq. "The companies want to control the workers..."
Bangladesh has about 4,000 garment factories and earns about £12.5bn a year from clothes exports. The body responsible for enforcing workplace safety laws has only 20 government inspectors for all the factories in Bangladesh.
£23 is the salary of an assistant sewer for working a 48-hour week at the Tazreen factory. £20 is the price of a pair of ‘Driftwood’ shorts made on the hip-hop star Sean Combs’ ENYCE label, which were made at the factory.
As for those companies like Edinburgh Woolen Mills who, while having no direct ownership, rely on Bangladesh for their textile products, they continue to plead their ignorance. They say they had no knowledge of the woeful safety conditions. Like those upstanding German citizens who lived in towns adjacent to Nazi death camps, they claim to have had no idea what was going on.
Bangladesh, the world's second-largest producer of clothes, has secured this position only by offering workers the lowest wages in the world and having some of the worst safety regulations in the industry. Before last week's disaster, more than 500 garment workers had died in fires and accidents since 2006. Land is at a premium in the country, and it is common for factories to have eight or nine floors. And although factories may have escape gates, owners often prefer to lock them, supposedly to stop staff stealing merchandise. In 2006, 65 workers died in a garment factory fire in the southern city of Chittagong after management ordered gates to be locked.
By most accounts, the Bangladesh tragedy could have been prevented by management simply spending more money on safety. Money for new fire extinguishers, money for more access, money for additional fire escapes, money for conducting regular evacuation drills, and money for old-fashioned fire prevention measures
"All these fires in Bangladesh, if you look at why so many die and are injured, in most cases it is because you find that the doors are locked," said a Bangladeshi architect, Bashirul Huq. "The companies want to control the workers..."
Bangladesh has about 4,000 garment factories and earns about £12.5bn a year from clothes exports. The body responsible for enforcing workplace safety laws has only 20 government inspectors for all the factories in Bangladesh.
£23 is the salary of an assistant sewer for working a 48-hour week at the Tazreen factory. £20 is the price of a pair of ‘Driftwood’ shorts made on the hip-hop star Sean Combs’ ENYCE label, which were made at the factory.
As for those companies like Edinburgh Woolen Mills who, while having no direct ownership, rely on Bangladesh for their textile products, they continue to plead their ignorance. They say they had no knowledge of the woeful safety conditions. Like those upstanding German citizens who lived in towns adjacent to Nazi death camps, they claim to have had no idea what was going on.
3 comments:
The loss of life is shocking. But using EWM in a sentence that also references the holocaust is disgusting, of you. Further, the absence of knowledge of facts about this incident leaves you hypocritically in ignorance.
In the UK alone, between 1966 and 2006, more than 40,000 people have been killed in work-related circumstances, according to Gary Slapper, professor of Law at the Open University. only 34 companies were prosecuted and only seven convictions were secured. In Scotland, only one company has ever been prosecuted for corporate homicide. 12,000 deaths a year due to occupational illnesses. 14,000 new cases of workplace cancers registered every year.
In just the United States since 1970 more than 360,000 workers have died on the job in safety accidents, while only 84 cases have been prosecuted for the willful violation of safety rules that resulted in a worker's death. Even if convicted, the penalty for wrongfully killing a worker on the job is only 6 months. In his March 16, 2010, testimony before the Subcommittee on Workforce Protections, and the Committee on Education and Labor, David Michaels, Assistant Secretary for Occupational Safety and Health, explained that the median initial penalty for all investigations in cases where a worker was killed was just $5,900. “the maximum civil penalty OSHA may impose when a hard-working man or woman is killed on the job—even when the death is caused by WILFUL VIOLATION of an OSHA requirement—is $70,000.”
According to the International Labour Organization, more than 337 million accidents happen on the job each year, resulting, together with occupational diseases, in more than 2.3 million deaths ANNUALLY.
I will leave other readers to judge whether the negligence demonstrated by the capitalist system to the health, safety and welfare of its workers is accidents or systematic neglect.
But one thing is sure, businesses cannot say they did not know, the figures are available of what can be described as a holocaust of victims worldwide.
In particular regard to Edinburgh Woollen Mills i refer you to this report "Edinburgh Woollen Mill have been exposed for using North Korean sweatshop labour to make their clothes."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/9612939.stm
You're known by the company(or the companies)you keep (or contract with)!
EWM if appropriately subject to capitalist Law would be told that ignorance is no defence.
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