Clothes - Ethical Consumer

Transcription

£4.25
EC132 September/October 2011
www.ethicalconsumer.org
What to wear
Buyers’ Guides
to clothes:
High Street shops
Alternative brands
Jeans
E-tailers
Plus:
What’s the
ethical cost
of our public
service selloff?
Editorial
www.ethicalconsumer.org SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011
Katy Brown
Editor
Twin tyrannies:
tax avoidance and exploitation
withdrawn. In addition, more women are employed by
the public sector and therefore face unemployment, or reemployment by private companies with, in all likelihood,
worse pay and conditions.
A recent quote from Action Aid – ‘Tax avoidance is as
big an issue as sweatshops’ – is particularly relevant for
Tax avoidance also has an impact on the majority world’s
this issue of the magazine, with us taking another hard
women, with many governments too strapped for cash to
look at the garment industry and also examining planned
provide basic services. Women inevitably bear the brunt
changes to corporation tax, which will make it even easier
of this. Charity donations from the individuals in the West
for UK companies to shirk their
– urgently needed when crises such
tax obligations. Equally prescient
Around the globe people are
as the current famine devastating
is the ground-breaking research
parts of Africa hit - address
fighting back: from garment
we have conducted on some of the
symptoms not causes, and would be
companies currently circling like
workers on the streets of
far less necessary if multinational
vultures in eager anticipation of the
companies engaged in extracting
Bangladesh
to
the
high
streets
corporate carve up of our public
resources from these countries paid
services.
of Britain, where the buildings their dues.
of the biggest corporate tax
Our findings indicate that not only
is tax avoidance indeed as big an
Resistance
dodgers have been occupied
issue as sweatshops, but that the two
Around the globe people are fighting
issues are part of the same wider
back:
from
the
streets
of
Bangladesh, where garment
problem, that of large corporations exploiting the current
workers
have
been
protesting
against their working
system to maximise profits at the expense of any genuine
conditions, to the high streets of Britain, where UK Uncut
commitment to social responsibility. The most glaring
have been occupying the buildings of the biggest corporate
example is that of Philip Green, whose Arcadia Group
tax dodgers. At Ethical Consumer we are proud to play our
continues to be implicated in both sweatshop labour and
tax avoidance. The companies rubbing their hands in glee at part by helping to expose the corporate misbehaviour that
so badly needs challenging.
the Coalition’s privatisation plans are no better, with many
implicated in tax avoidance along with having poor ethical
Join Ethical Consumer for our
track records across our ratings criteria.
To an extent however, these companies are merely
stretching the rules of the game. The current economic
system has been designed to funnel wealth from the poor
to the rich: labour laws lax or not enforced allow companies
to exploit workers around the globe, whilst the existence
of tax havens is clearly sanctioned by the powers that be.
The cuts to, and privatisation of, public services that we
are facing here in the UK, rather than being an unexpected
nasty consequence of alleged over-spending by the previous
government, are part of globally agreed policy to open
everything up to the free market. The West has been
imposing this on majority world countries for years.
Women’s issues
You will notice that, for the first time in a few years, this
magazine is edited by a woman. We were keen to have an
emphasis on women’s issues in this edition and, as part of
the clothing report, we look at why fashion is a feminist
issue.
The cuts in general disproportionately affect women, and
many women-specific services have already had funding
Annual General Meeting
We’d like to take this opportunity to invite you to our AGM
and conference on September 23rd. If you’d like to become
part of our wider decision making process, consider
becoming an investor member for a minimum investment
of £200. I would particularly like to invite female investor
members to stand for our Board of Directors. I’m conscious
of the fact that our recently established Board, like so many
others, is currently made up of more men than women. We
need to be careful not to inadvertently replicate the gender
imbalances, which occur in wider society, within our own
alternative structures. We are also delighted to have Ed
Mayo, Secretary General of Co-operatives UK, attending
our AGM as a guest speaker. For more details, see page 39.
Planned for future issues:
Boycotts Special, Pasta, Pasta Sauces, Banks,
Insurance, Pensions, Mortgages, Cosmetics Special,
Toilet Paper, Soya Products, Light Bulbs, Batteries,
Washing-up liquid, Tinned Vegetables.
who’s who
editors Katy Brown, Leonie Nimmo, Dan Welch,
Rob Harrison
proofing Ruth Binns, Ciara Maginness
writers/researchers Katy Brown, Bryony Moore, Jane
Turner, Dan Welch, Tim Hunt, Jo Southall, Leonie
Nimmo, Rob Harrison, Heather Webb
contributors Simon Birch, Shaun Fensom, Giles Simon
design and layout Adele Armistead (moonloft.com),
Jane Turner
cover Polyp
cartoons Marc Roberts, Andy Vine, Chris Madden
ad sales Simon Birch
subscriptions Elizabeth Chater, Heather Webb
enquiries Leonie Nimmo, Tim Hunt
press enquiries Dan Welch
research, screening & consultancy Rob Harrison
internet/web Michael Wignall
marketing Jane Turner
buyers’
guides
subscriptions & renewals
Phone 0161 226 2929 or go to
www.ethicalconsumer.org.
copyright
All material correct one month before cover date and ©
Ethical Consumer Research Association Ltd. Notfor-profit organisations may normally reproduce
without charge any of the material appearing in Ethical
Consumer, providing that all such material is credited and
providing that written permission has been sought prior to
publication. No part of this publication may be produced
by commercial organisations without written permission
from Ethical Consumer Research Association Ltd.
ISSN 0955 8608.
Printed by RAP Spiderweb Ltd, c/o the Commercial
Centre, Clowes Centre, Hollinwood, Oldham OL9 7LY.
0161 947 3700.
Paper: The cover is printed on 170gsm Cocoon Silk
100% post-consumer waste and the inside pages on
80gsm Corona from 100% post-consumer waste.
Retail distribution is handled by Central Books on
0845 458 9911.
Ethical Consumer is a member of INK (independent
news collective), an association of
radical and alternative publishers.
about the advertisers
www.ink.uk.com
letters
a regular forum for readers’ views
42
subscriptions
take out a subscription
or give one as a gift
45
inside view
ECRA checks out advertisers before accepting their ads
and reserves the right to refuse any advert.
have sweatshop campaigns made any
difference?
Covered in previous buyers’ guides: Covered in
previous buyers’ guides: Bishopston Trading (132),
Charity Bank (118), Community Foods (114), Cooperative Bank (118), ETA (109), Good Energy (95),
Gossypium (132), Green ISP (102), Green Stationery
Company (96), Kingfisher Toothpaste (110), Phone Co-op
(111), Solartwin (131), Triodos (118) Vegetarian Shoes
(98).
Ethical Consumer Research Association Ltd
Other advertisers: Brookes Donkey Sanctuary, Ethical
Currency, Ethical Investment Co-op, Glasu, Green Shop,
If You Care, Manchester Futon Company, One Village,
Organico, Practical Action, Quakers, Slade & Cooper.
Unit 21, 41 Old Birley Street,
Manchester M15 5RF
tel 0161 226 2929 (12 noon-6pm).
fax 0161 226 6277.
email [email protected] for general enquiries
or [email protected] for subscriptions.
46
Contents
08 27
clothes
How the companies compare:
High Street shops 10
Alternative companies 16
analysis
Jeans
21 E-tailers 26
06food and home
GM labelling, whales and chips, peat campaign
Also inside:
29boycotts
H&M, Donna Karan, Canadian seafood, Indian road
•
Why fashion is a feminist issue page 9
• Campaigns hit harder in the UK page 13
• Toxic waste and water shortages page 15
• Is ethical fashion ever possible? page 18
• Is the British wool industry staging
a comeback? page 19
• Sandblasting of jeans exposed page 23
• Stand up for the workers who sew
our clothes page 24
32
comment &
feature
public service
fire-sale
31good technology
dark side of Volkswagen, electric cars, mobile phones and cancer
36tax justice
corporation tax cut
37money
pay inequalities, tax avoidance, ethical and green funds
39ethical consumer one day conference
conference and AGM in September
41climate of change
climate campaigns and camps, Reverend Billy, cement companies and carbon permits
41
Food
SEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011 www.ethicalconsumer.org
UK fish and chips linked to
Icelandic whale slaughter
There are currently 10,500 fish
and chip shops in the UK – is yours
selling fish supplied by whalers?
The WDCS (the Whale and Dolphin
Conservation Society) are running
a campaign to stop fish connected
with whaling being sold in the UK.
A major UK fish wholesaler,
Doncaster-based Warners Fish Merchants
Ltd, supplies scores
of UK restaurants,
fish and chip shops
and hotels with
cod and haddock
sourced from an
Icelandic company
linked to the killing
of endangered fin
whales. You won’t
see Warners’ brand name on your high
street but you could be eating its fish.
Classified by many countries as an
endangered species, the fin whale is
the second largest animal in the world
after the blue whale with around 30,000
believed to be left in the North Atlantic.
Although commercial whaling is
banned, countries like Iceland, Norway
and Japan are still allowed to hunt whales
for ‘scientific research’.
WDCS is asking supporters to:
1. Contact Warners. Use the email letter
on the WDCS website which asks the
company to reconsider where it sources its
fish because you do not wish to buy fish
linked to whaling.
2. Join the WDCS. Iceland’s whaling defies
international agreements. Help urge the US
government to impose trade sanctions on
Iceland’s fish exports.
For more information, go to the Fish and
Chip campaign website at
www.wdcs.org/stop/killing_trade/iceland.
php which also lists supermarkets and other
outlets that have agreed not to sell this fish,
as well as those companies who still do.
Consumer rights victory as US ends opposition
to GM labelling guidelines
Global consumer campaign group Consumers
International (CI) celebrated victory at the beginning of
July as regulators from more than 100 countries agreed
on long overdue guidance on the labelling of genetically
modified (GM) food.
The Codex Alimentarius Commission, made up of the world’s
food safety regulatory agencies, has been labouring for two
decades to come up with consensus guidance on this topic.
In a striking reversal of their previous position, the US
delegation dropped its opposition to the GM labelling guidance
document, allowing it to move forward and become an official
Codex text.
This will have immediate implications for consumers. Edita
Vilcapoma of the Peruvian consumer group ASPEC, representing
Consumers International at the Codex meeting in Geneva, said:
“Peru’s recent introduction of GM food labelling faced the threat
of a legal challenge from the WTO. This new Codex agreement
now means that this threat has gone and the consumer right to
be informed has been secured. This is a major victory for the
global consumer movement.”
Samuel Ochieng, President Emeritus of Consumers
International and CEO of the Kenyan Consumer Information
Network said: “While the agreement falls short of the consumer
movement’s long-held demand for endorsement of mandatory
GM food labelling, this is still a significant milestone for
consumer rights. We congratulate Codex on agreeing on this
guidance, which has been sought by consumers and regulators
in African countries for nearly twenty years. This guidance is
extremely good news for the world’s consumers who want to
know what is in the food on their plates”.
Image © Bogdan Wankowicz | Dreamstime.com
The new Codex agreement means that any country wishing
to adopt GM food labelling will no longer face the threat of
a legal challenge from the World Trade Organization (WTO).
This is because national measures based on Codex guidance or
standards cannot be challenged as a barrier to trade.
The agreement also recognises the enormous health
monitoring benefits of giving consumers transparent information
about the presence of GM foods. Now, if consumers eat
modified foods, they will be able to know and report to
regulators if they have an allergic or other adverse reaction.
Home
Matthew Roberts
I don’t dig peat
A new campaign has just been
launched which calls on UK
gardeners to make the ‘PeatFree Promise’ and stop using
peat products in favour of
environmentally friendly alternatives.
Through a dedicated website set up by
the charity Garden Organic, gardeners
can make the ‘Peat-Free Promise’ and
access information on how to garden
successfully without peat.
Every year in the UK the equivalent
of over 24 million wheelbarrows of
endangered peat is used unnecessarily by
amateur gardeners.
This is just one of the findings from
new research carried out by Garden
Organic (aka Henry Doubleday Research
Association), the UK’s leading organic gardening charity.
The research reveals how in their quest to live the Good Life,
made so appealing by celebrity gardeners and chefs, amateur
gardeners are actually living what the charity has coined the
‘Good Lie’ – in other words, in striving to be self-sufficient,
they’re inadvertently doing more harm than good to the
environment.
Amateur gardeners are responsible for needlessly using
two-thirds of the three million cubic metres of peat used in the
UK every year, largely in the form of multi-purpose peat-based
compost. Peat is used in compost because it’s cheap, light,
retains moisture and stores nutrients. However, in extracting
peat from its natural home, its ability to store four times as
much carbon as forests is lost, while the habitat of rare wildlife
is destroyed. As a result all but a tiny proportion of the UK’s
natural peatlands have been wiped out forever.
While it’s gardeners who are the end-users, Garden
Organic believes retailers and manufacturers also have to take
responsibility for the UK’s massive consumption of peat. The
charity says limited peat-free alternatives and misleading onpack claims compound the problem, and is calling for more to
be done to improve access to peat-free products.
To sign the Peat-Free Promise and for more information, visit
www.idontdigpeat.org.uk or call 024 7630 3517.
Chat Moss peat extraction area in the background and a contrasting
healthy mossland in the foreground.
Chat Moss saved
Some of the last remaining lowland peat bogs in the UK are to
be found at Salford Mosses. One company, William Sinclair’s
(J Arthur Bower’s composts), restarted illegal peat extraction at
Chat Moss in April. The company’s licence to extract peat had
expired at the end of last year but the company carried on,
hoping permission would be granted to extract peat for the next
15 years. Unfortunately for them, in June the application was
refused by Salford City Council.
Dr. Chris Miller from the Wildlife Trust for Lancashire,
Manchester and North Merseyside said it was the first time
that an application for peat extraction has been turned down
by the council. It was also the first time that peat extraction’s
negative impact on climate change has been cited as a reason
for refusing permission. Large amounts of CO2 are released in
the extraction process.
The company has now lodged an appeal against the decision
which is expected to be heard this autumn. They believe that
peat is still the best available growing media in terms of cost.
Cookers Correction
In the buyers’ guide to Cookers in the last issue (131,
July/Aug) we stated that gas cookers have to “be fitted by a
Gas Safe Registered tradesperson”. The Gas Safe Register
(formerly Corgi) would like us to clarify that:
Gas Safe Register ID card that the engineer is registered for
the specific type of work you need. If they’re registered to fit
gas boilers, it doesn’t mean they are automatically qualified
to put in a gas fire, for example.”
“For anyone thinking about having a gas appliance fitted,
whether second hand or new, by law they should only use
a Gas Safe registered engineer. Check on the back of the
To find a Gas Safe registered engineer in your area call
the free helpline on 0800 408 5500 or go to
www.GasSafeRegister.co.uk
Clothes
What to wear
I
t’s no news that our voracious appetite for ever-changing
fashions is having a devastating impact on both the
environment and people across the globe. In the UK, the
average female buys half her bodyweight in clothes each year and
owns four times as many garments today as she did in 1980.1
But perhaps the tide is about to turn. In 2010, 82% of adults
claimed to make their clothes last.2 Market researchers Mintel
think “the disposable fashion trend could have peaked and 2011
may see shoppers reassessing value for money and putting more
emphasis on sustainability, integrity and durability.”2
In this special issue on clothing we look particularly at the
recent struggles of garment workers around the world, the
majority of whom are women. The first sweatshop stories broke
in the nineties but how much progress has been made since then?
At Ethical Consumer we’re calling for UK consumers to make
2011 the year when things turn around for garment workers by
pulling out all the stops and supporting their fight for a better
deal.
We also catch up with the latest environmental campaigns
relating to the clothing industry and look at some positive
examples of businesses which put people and planet before profit.
Inside these pages you’ll find buyers’ guides to high street
brands and jeans companies, as well as a guide to alternative
brands which are leading the field in environmental and social
responsibility. More and more of us today choose to shop online
rather than face Saturday’s high street mobs, with 60% saying
they’d rather browse online than in-store,2 so this time around
we’re also including a buyers’ guide to e-tailers (on-line retailers).
References 1 Clothes: Too much, too cheap, www.independent.co.uk, 14 June
2011 2 Clothing retailing market report, Mintel, 2010
See how the companies compare:
High Street shops 10
Alternative companies 16
Jeans
E-tailers
21
26
Also inside:
• Why fashion is a feminist issue page 9
• In ethically-sensitive Britain our campaigns
hit harder page 13
• Toxic waste and water shortages – a look at the
latest EJF and Greenpeace campaigns page 15
• Ethical fashion – is it ever possible? Ruth
Rosselson spots an oxymoron page 18
• Wool – is the British wool industry staging a
comeback? page 19
• Dying for a distressed look – sandblasting
exposed page 23
• Change is in the air – now is the time to stand up
for those who sew our clothes page 24
© Dmitriy Shironosov | Dreamstime.com
September/October 2011 www.ethicalconsumer.org
Buyers’ Guide
Why fashion is a
feminist issue
By Ruth Rosselson
E
thical Consumer has covered clothes
in its pages many times over the
years. We’ve tended to concentrate
on flagging up the issues of workers’ rights
overseas, the rise of fast fashion and of
the sustainability – or not – of the fabrics
and the industry. Missing from all this
is a gendered perspective. Yet, of all the
products covered by us, clothing is the one
area where we should be applying more of
a gendered and feminist perspective.
It’s not just that the workers in overseas
factories – or working from home - are
more likely to be women than men. That’s
likely to be the case for many products
manufactured overseas. As Women
Working Worldwide say, “the increased
demand of the globalised economy for low
cost, flexible and dispensable workforce
often means a preference for female
labour”.1
It’s also the fact that, more than any
other product on sale today, clothing has a
level of meaning to it far greater than just
being items of cloth to cover our bodies.
What we choose to wear means so much
more. In many societies across the world,
clothing is integral to gender identity;
there is an acceptable uniform of clothing
for men and women. These uniforms
may differ between cultures but negative
consequences for not adhering to them are
global.
The clothes women wear are publicly
scrutinised, debated and even policed in a
way that men’s attire is not. This can take a
variety of forms:
• Media approval (or not) for what
women in the public eye wear. This
isn’t just limited to women’s magazines
but happens across the media.
• Verbal reactions ranging from cat calling, name calling and teasing.
• Physical reactions from sexual
harassment to stone throwing.
• Accusations that particular styles of
dress are to blame for sexual abuse or
physical attacks.
• Legislation to prevent women wearing
the burka – such as in France.
This level of scrutiny and policing just
does not happen to men’s attire – though
that’s not to say that it doesn’t happen at
all.
Then there’s the issue of sizing and
body image – women’s shape and form
– and how the fashion industry chooses
women of a certain size and shape and
promotes this as an ideal. Plenty has been
written about this elsewhere.
When it comes to gender identity in
2011 UK, what’s considered by the media
and popular culture to be feminine is
actually so far from our natural state
that even celebrities such as Cheryl Cole
and Victoria Beckham have to spend an
inordinate amount of time, money and
effort on diets and airbrushing to fit (or to
define) the mould. Part and parcel of this
is the emphasis put on clothing. Popular
culture dictates that a special occasion
requires a brand new outfit. It dictates that
we should be ‘refreshing’ our wardrobe
and reinventing ourselves periodically.
God forbid that we should wear the same
outfit twice! Whereas there used to be
four seasons of clothing, now fashion and
seasons change almost by the week.
This means that the way that gender,
particularly women’s identity, is currently
constructed in the UK directly facilitates
fast fashion, which is in turn responsible
for the way that companies do business.
As campaigners have said time and
time again, it’s virtually impossible for
companies to behave ethically if they’re
asking for ever quicker turnarounds and
ever cheaper prices. Asking companies
to behave ethically, while they’re still
supporting the idea that women need to
keep up with the latest fashions, is like
asking for the impossible.
As well as the way that our clothes
are made, we need to move away from
the emphasis on how a woman looks
– whether she’s wearing a veil or a
mini-skirt. This also means tackling and
dismantling our artificially constructed
idea of ‘womanhood’.
From the women making clothes who
are barely paid enough to live on, to the
women used to model our clothes; from
the women punished for not dressing
‘appropriately’ to the women getting into
debt to afford their clothing habit, fast
fashion is a feminist issue.
This article is adapted from a blog written
by Ruth Rosselson for London Fashion
week: http://ruthrosselson.net/2010/09/15/
fast-fashion-is-a-feminist-issue/
Ruth Rosselson is a freelance writer and
editor http://RuthRosselson.net and tweets
from @RuthRosselson
References 1 Women Working Worldwide website:
www.women-ww.org/index.php/approach-amethodology viewed 25/7/2011
Clothes
High
Street
Ethics on the High Street
People
Politics
+ve
USING THE TABLES
Workers’ Rights
Ann Harvey
8.5
H
h
H
h
H
H
h
Mango
8.5
H
h
H
H
h
h
h
h
Punta NA Holding
New Look
8.5
H
h
H
h
H
h
H
New Look/Apax/Permira
Uniqlo
8.5
H
h
h
h
h
H
h
h
M&Co
8
H
H
H
h
H
H
h
Coast
7.5
H
H
h
h
h
h
GAP
7.5
H
H
h
H
Monsoon [F or O]
7.5
H
H
H
H
h
H
Oasis
7.5
H
h
H
h
H
h
h
h
h
h
Arion Bank
Warehouse
7.5
H
h
H
h
H
h
h
h
h
h
Arion Bank
Zara [O]
H
H
H
H
h
H
H
h
H
H
H
H
h
h
H
H
H
H
h
h
h
Next plc
H
h
H
H
h
H
Henson No.1 Ltd
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
H
h
h
H
h
H
H
H
h
Product Sustainability
Company Ethos
Anti-Social Finance
Political Activity
Boycott Call
• Company Ethos:
Genetic Engineering
Arms & Military Supply
Human Rights
H
Irresponsible Marketing
Animal Rights
h
Factory Farming
H
Animal Testing
h
Habitats & Resources
H
= middle rating,
empty = top rating
(no criticisms).
Pollution & Toxics
9.5
= bottom rating,
Climate Change
New Look [O]
H
h
Nuclear Power
BRAND
Environmental Reporting
Positive ratings (+ve):
Ethiscore (out of 20)
Animals
Supply Chain Management
Environment
USING THE TABLES
Ethiscore: the higher
the score, the better the
company across the criticism
categories.
Shops
1
H
e
E
= full mark,
= half mark.
• Product Sustainability:
Maximum of five positive
marks.
COMPANY GROUP
Alexon Group
Fast Retailing Co
Mackays Stores Group
h
H
h
Arion Bank
h
The Gap Inc
1
Monsoon Holdings (Jersey)
7.5
H
H
Bonmarché
7
H
H
Marks & Spencer [F or O]
7
H
h
Next
7
H
H
h
Peacocks
7
H
H
Benetton [O]
6.5
H
h
H
H&M [O]
6.5
h
H
H
Matalan
6.5
H
H
H
h
H
h
H
Missouri Topco
Monsoon
6.5
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
H
Monsoon Holdings (Jersey)
Zara
6.5
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
h
Inditex/Gartler
Marks & Spencer
6
Topshop/Topman
6
H
Benetton
5.5
H
H&M
5.5
h
John Lewis [F]
5.5
h
Debenhams
5
John Lewis
4.5
TK Maxx
4.5
H
4
H
3.5
Sainsbury’s TU [F]
Sainsbury’s TU
H
H
h
H
h
h
h
h
H
h
h
Marks & Spencer Group
1
Edizione Holding
1
Ramsbury Invest
h
h
H
H
H
H
h
h
H
h
H
h
H
h
H
h
h
H
Philip Green
h
H
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3
h
H
H
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H
2
h
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
Tesco [F or O]
1.5
h
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
Tesco
0.5
h
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
0
h
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
ASDA George
1
h
h
Inditex/Gartler
Henson No.1 Ltd
h
H
Primark
1
h
H
h
River Island
h
h
Edizione Holding
h
H
h
H
E
H
E
h
H
h
h
h
H
h
Ramsbury Invest
1
John Lewis Partnership
Debenhams plc
John Lewis Partnership
TJX Companies Inc
h
H
LFH International
Wittington Investments
h
h
H
h
h
H
h
H
h
h
H
h
H
h
H
h
H
h
H
H
H
H
h
H
h
H
H
H
Tesco plc
H
h
H
H
H
Wal-Mart Stores Inc
H
H
1
J Sainsbury plc
J Sainsbury plc
1
Tesco plc
Alexon also owns Dash, Eastex, Kaliko and Minuet Petite. Philip Green also owns Burton, Dorothy Perkins, Evans, Miss Selfridge, Outfit and Wallis.
[F] = Fairtrade [O] = Organic
See all the research behind these ratings together in a PDF of this report at www.ethicalconsumer.org/researchreports. £3 or free to subscribers.
10
Buyers’ Guide
su mer m
None of the
companies on this
table perform well
BE
enough
to be eligible
S T BU
for our Best Buy label.
See the ‘Alternative clothes
companies’ table on page 16 for a
list of best-practice companies who
do receive our stamp of approval.
However, it’s not all doom and gloom.
Companies’ responsiveness to campaign
pressure means that as consumers we
However,
have the opportunity, as well as the
the New Look
9.5
responsibility, to make a real difference
organic range
by supporting campaigns. See the
is the next best
workers’ rights stories on page 24 for a
option.
list of campaigns and organisations to get
New Look come top of our
involved with.
supply chain management table on
page 14.
Supply chain management
Last time we covered clothes in Ethical
Consumer magazine, we weighted our
supply chain policy criteria, to reflect
the importance of protecting workers’
rights in this sector which is renowned
for its use of cheap labour overseas. This
time around, partly influenced by these
ratings, we have a newly-implemented
set of criteria, now called ‘supply chain
management.’ As well as a company’s
policies, these take into account
the efforts it is making to
tackle difficult issues in it’s
supply chain such as
access to trade unions
in countries such as
China where they are
illegal. Examples of best
practice include working
with Non-Governmental
Organisations (NGOs)
and employing specialists to monitor
conditions.
In recognition of the fact that
companies must go further than simply
posting a policy up on their website,
the new criteria reward those which are
spending time and money investigating
how these problems can
be tackled. It will be
interesting to monitor
companies’ progress
against these criteria going
forwards.
See the table on page 14 for a
comparison of the High Street companies’
policies.
Animal rights
Ethical Consumer marks down companies
which sell animal products that have
involved the killing of animals. Companies
have received negative marks in this
column for the sale of the following:
• silk (which involves the killing of silk
worms)
• leather (a slaughterhouse by-product
worth around 5-10% of the market value of an animal)11
• Australian merino wool (which often
involves the use of the cruel practice
of ‘mulesing’ – cutting a flap of skin
from the animals’ rumps to avoid
a summer infestation of flies and
maggots).
In this buyers’ guide we have not
marked down companies for the
use of other wool.
Cotton sourcing
We asked all companies for a cotton
sourcing policy, recognising the huge
environmental and social impacts of the
crop. Large companies which are unable to
demonstrate that they avoid GM cotton,
or cotton originating from Uzbekistan,
or which have no concrete plan to phase
out non-organic cotton by a certain date,
receive marks in our Genetic Engineering,
Workers’ Rights and Pollution & Toxics
categories respectively.
Additional research by Katy Brown, Leonie Nimmo and Jo Southall.
11
© Liumangtiger | Dreamstime.com
How we’ve rated the
companies
Y
e th
azine
O
ne of the most interesting
aspects of re-rating the clothing
companies this time around has
been comparing their performance against
previous ratings. Ethical Consumer’s
data, which tracks the Corporate Social
Responsibility performance of these
companies over a 20 year period, makes
it startlingly apparent just how much
campaigns shape corporate behaviour.
Over the next few pages, we pick out a few
examples and hold them up for scrutiny.
In 2001, in response to campaigners’
calls, the European Commission produced
proposals for a new system of Registration,
Evaluation and Authorisation of
Chemicals and, by 2007, legislation was in
place that limited the harmful chemicals
present in products. After this, many
companies publicly stated their policies on
reducing these substances.2 However, until
recently, the spotlight had moved away
from chemicals somewhat, with Friends
of the Earth and WWF both ending
campaigns on toxic chemicals within two
years of each other.1 So in 2011 many
companies appear to have taken their eye
off the ball in relation to chemicals, with
many of those on our score table opposite
having no such policy at all. Read how
we are supporting Greenpeace’s Dirty
Laundry report and campaign, and what
we are asking of companies, on page 15.
The same goes for PVC – after a
massive backlash against this toxic
substance, companies responded by
banning it from their products. Some
companies, which had banned PVC in all
sectors, not just clothing, are now using
it again, and many of the companies on
the table opposite sell some products
containing PVC. H&M commendably
removed PVC from all products in 2002
but, fast forward to 2011, and products
containing PVC are displayed on their
website once again.
On page 13 we look at the campaign
against forced child labour in the
Uzbekistani cotton harvest, and how
companies are responding differently to
this campaign and others, depending on
whether they’re located in the USA or UK.
on
ag
Bryony Moore examines companies’
responsiveness to campaign pressure, and
points out why consumers are well placed
to make a difference.
i c al c
Clothes
Gold
Ethical Consumer writer Leonie
Nimmo recently appeared on Channel
4’s Dispatches to challenge high street
jewellers’ claims that they knew where
their gold came from. The programme
‘The Real Price of Gold’ uncovered the
shocking reality of gold mines, including
child labour, dangerous mining conditions
and communities poisoned by pollution.
Secretly filmed assistants working for
Argos, Ernest Jones and Goldsmiths were
found to be making misleading claims
about how and where their gold was
sourced. “Most companies have no idea
where the gold they sell comes from”, says
Leonie. “All they know is that it comes
from banks, as admitted by a spokesperson
from Signet, the biggest jewellery retailer
in the UK. Companies need to take urgent
action to ensure that their gold supply
chains are not tainted by human rights
abuses and environmental destruction”.
Companies that appear in this issue
(see also the e-tailers table on page 26)
that sell gold products but make no
commitments to source responsibly lose
half a mark in the human rights and
pollution and toxics categories. Those that
make no credible claims about responsible
diamond sourcing lose an extra half mark
in the human rights category due to the
diamond trade’s fuelling of conflict in
Africa.
Visit the Dispatches website to sign the
pledge calling on the British jewellery
industry to clean up its act – s.coop/3fu7.
The No Dirty Gold campaign is calling
on British jewellery retailers to sign the 12
Golden Rules for responsible gold mining
– see www.nodirtygold.org.
Company profiles
The rich get richer...
Last December tax avoidance protesters
UK Uncut targeted Arcadia Group,
as its holding company is registered
in Jersey, a tax haven.3 Added to this,
rather than being registered as Sir Philip
Green’s (the public face of the brand),
the company is registered under the
name of his wife, Tina, who lives in 0%
income tax zone Monaco.4
Other companies whose company
groups were found to use tax havens
are: John Lewis Partnership, River
Island, MNG-MANGO U.K. Ltd,
Uniqlo, Aurora Fashions, Gap Inc,
Inditex, H&M, Marks & Spencer, TJX
Companies Inc and Primark.10
Marks & Spencer, River Island and
Arcadia have also been criticised for
excessive director’s remuneration (total
annual amounts over £1million).10
...and the poor get poorer
A disappointingly large number of
companies on the table make no
committment in their supply chain
policy to paying workers a living wage,
namely Wal-Mart, Alexon Group (no
policy at all), MNG-MANGO U.K.
Ltd, Fast Retailing Co. Ltd (Uniqlo),
Gap, Benetton (no policy at all), H&M,
Matalan, Marks & Spencer, TK Maxx,
River Island and Sainsbury’s.
12
UK Uncut target Arcadia Group over tax avoidance.
Taking Liberties, a recent report published
by Labour Behind the Label and War on
Want, exposed workers’ rights abuses
in the garment industry in the city of
Gurgaon, India, where many high street
retailers have their clothes made. Abuses
included poverty wages, discrimination
and non-promotion. Companies named
as sourcing from the factories studied
were: Arcadia Group, Debenhams, H&M,
Marks & Spencer, Monsoon and NEXT.7
Several companies on our high street
clothing and jeans tables were named
as buying from sportswear factories in
India, Sri Lanka and the Philippines,
where the International Textile Garment
& Leather Workers’ Federation (ITGLWF)
reported poor working conditions. These
were: Tesco, Walmart, Levi’s, The North
Face (owned by VF Corp), NEXT, Tommy
Hilfiger, Calvin Klein, Marks & Spencer
and Gap.8
Animal testing
Many clothing companies produce their
own cosmetics ranges. If this is an issue
close to your heart, look out for animal
testing policies, as we found a large
number of companies which had none
at all. These are marked by a full circle
on the table under Animal Testing.
Sainsbury’s get a worst rating for having
a reasonable, but not best, policy for
their own-brand products and also
selling branded animal-tested products.
Boycotts
A boycott was called against H&M in
March 2010 by the Palestinian Boycott,
Divestment and Sanctions (BDS)
Movement. See Boycotts on page 29 for
more information.9
© JohnLucas1983, www.flickr.com
But Arcadia aren’t the only tax dodgers
in this buyers’ guide – companies found
to be owned by holding companies
in tax havens include: New Look,
Monsoon, Peacocks, Bonmarché,
Matalan Ltd and River Island.
Buyers’ Guide
© Roman Samokhin | Dreamstime.com
In ethically-sensitive Britain,
we have a responsibility to act
I
n this globalised world it is sometimes
easy to forget that a company in the
UK can be a completely different
creature to its namesake in the U.S.
When it comes to corporate responses
to campaigns, you can see very different
results depending which side of the pond
you’re on.
In June 2011, a report published by the
Institute for Global Labour and Human
Rights revealed that workers at a garment
factory in Jordan had been routinely
beaten, underpaid and forced to work
excessive hours. In addition to this and
bed bug infested dormitories without
heat or hot water, a pattern of widespread
sexual abuse of female employees was
discovered at the factory, most of whom
were migrant workers from South Asia.
A month later, the five major American
brands which sourced from the factory
– Hanes, Kohl’s, Macy’s, Target and WalMart – refused to discuss their ongoing
relationships with the supplier, although
all except Hanes expressed concern.
In an interview with US-based online
magazine the Huffington Post, the
author of the report, Charles Kernaghan,
criticised the brands’ silence.5 “When we
first started with this I thought Wal-Mart
and Hanes – they are not into human
rights,” he said. “But we thought they
would draw the line in the sand at these
rapes. Instead, they’ve been virtually
silent.” This failure to respond to such
serious allegations would surely not have
happened had the companies been based
in the more ethically-sensitive UK or
Europe.
Take another example - in rating
companies for this buyers’ guide we
asked all companies for their policies
on sourcing cotton from Uzbekistan,
something the Environmental Justice
Foundation (EJF) has been campaigning
around for years due to the regime’s use
of forced child labour during the cotton
harvest. ASDA displays on its website an
outright ban on sourcing cotton from this
country.
Meanwhile, its US-based parent WalMart says in its 2011 Global Responsibility
Report that guaranteeing a supply free
from Uzbek cotton is impossible. We
contacted EJF about this issue – they
disagree, saying that the required papers
for exporting cotton create a paper trail
that can verify its origins.
This just goes to show that as
consumers in a country like the UK,
where companies are regularly held
to account for their actions, we have
leverage that should be employed both
in the UK and overseas. Our campaigns
should demand action not just from UKbased subsidiaries, but from their parent
companies too, wherever in the world
they are based. We want Wal-Mart to stop
buying Uzbek cotton, not just ASDA.
13
Clothes
Management of workers’ rights in High Street clothes companies’ supply chains
Company
Supply
Chain Policy
Stakeholder
Engagement
Audting and
Reporting
Difficult
Issues
TOTAL
SCORE
Table Rating
(page 10)
New Look
100
100
100
100
100
Best
Zara
67
100
67
33
67
Best
Gap
33
50
67
100
63
Best
Primark
100
50
33
67
63
Best
Monsoon
67
100
0
67
59
Best
H&M
67
50
33
67
54
Middle
Burton/Topshop/etc
67
50
0
100
54
Middle
Debenhams
100
50
0
33
46
Middle
Next
67
50
33
33
46
Middle
Tesco
0
50
33
67
38
Middle
Mango
33
50
33
33
37
Middle
M&S
33
50
33
33
37
Middle
Coast/Oasis/Warehouse
100
0
0
33
33
Middle
Sainsbury
0
50
0
67
29
Middle
ASDA
0
50
33
33
29
Middle
John Lewis
67
0
0
33
25
Middle
TK Maxx
33
0
0
33
17
Worst
Uniqlo
33
0
33
0
17
Worst
M&Co
0
50
0
0
13
Worst
River Island
0
50
0
0
13
Worst
Bonmarché/Peacocks
33
0
0
0
8
Worst
Matalan
0
0
33
0
8
Worst
Anne Harvey/Alexon etc
0
0
0
0
0
Worst
Dash/Eastex/Calico
0
0
0
0
0
Worst
Benetton
0
0
0
0
0
Worst
Promising supply chain initiatives
The problems endemic in clothing supply chains are such that companies operating individually cannot
hope to solve them. Here are just two examples of initiatives which seek to identify common problems
and use shared knowledge to find solutions.
Made-By, a European not-for-profit organisation, supports fashion brands in implementing good
environmental and social standards that can be developed and maintained within a commercial
environment. In working with Made-By, a company’s supply chain is made publicly available on the
organisation’s website. This level of transparency is key to improving sustainability and forms part of our
new supply chain ratings criteria. www.made-by.org
The Sustainable Apparel Coalition (SAC), is a coalition of several big-name brands*, plus manufacturers,
non-governmental organisations, academic experts and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. They
are working together to find a ‘common approach for measuring and evaluating apparel and footwear
product sustainability performance.’ The Index which SAC seeks to produce will not be publicly
available, however, although the coalition says that plans are afoot to produce a consumer-facing index.
Ethical Consumer awaits further developments with interest. www.apparelcoalition.org
*Including H&M, Levi’s, M&S, VF Corp and Wal-Mart of the companies in this buyers’ guide.
References 1 An Issue and a Campaign – ‘Chemicals and Health’ and ‘REACH’, pdf document downloaded from www.earthscan.co.uk
2 ec.europa.eu/environment/chemicals/reach/background/index_en.htm 3 www.ukuncut.org.uk/blog/press-release-nationwide-day-oftax-avoidance-protest-tomorrow 4 www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1302973/Is-Philip-Green-right-man-helping-Chancellor.html 5
www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/07/21/american-brands-abuses-factories-jordan-labor-conditions_n_903995.html 6 Captured by Cotton,
SOMO and ICN, May 2011 7 ‘Taking Liberties’, Labour Behind the Label and War on Want, December 2010 8 ‘An Overview of Working
Conditions in Sportswear Factories in Indonesia, Sri Lanka & the Philippines’, ITGLWF, April 2011 9 www.bdsmovement.net, viewed by
Ethical Consumer in July 2011 10 Ethical Consumer’s Corporate Critic database, July 2011 11 www.all-about-leather.co.uk, accessed on
29/07/11
14
images © Qiu Bo / Greenpeace
Buyers’ Guide
Toxic waste and water shortages
Water shortages
Juliette Williams from the Environmantal Justice Foundation gives us an
update on their Uzbek cotton campaign.
As we approach the start of the 2011 Uzbek cotton harvest, whilst we maintain our
engagement with proactive companies on the child labour issue, EJF’s work has also
turned to the use of water in cotton production. Cotton is the world’s thirstiest crop
- in Uzbekistan, in arid central asia, one kilo of cotton can require up to 20,000 litres of
water, amounting to over 20 billion cubic metres of water every year. 28,000 kilometres
of irrigation pipes and canals channel water away from rivers and into the fields,
resulting in an environmental catastrophe. Satellite images reveal that the Aral Sea,
once the world’s fourth largest inland sea, has been decimated and now just 8% of its
original volume remains. An area of 40,000 square kilometres of the original sea floor is
now left exposed as a dry and salty desert. Fishing communities that once thrived along
the Sea’s edge are now left stranded inland, where the population has lost its source
of income and is exposed to appalling health problems as a result of this new desert
area. The same causes of forced child labour apply to this environmental nightmare - a
Government that retains the use of Soviet-style cotton production quotas, which compel
farmers to grow the crop, even where the environment cannot sustain it. As consumers,
considering our ‘water footprint’ should be as important as our ‘carbon footprint’ and
we should support companies that are pushing for changes and efficiencies in the way
cotton is produced. An even better choice is to select organic cotton from West Africa or
elsewhere, where the cotton is rain-fed rather than irrigated.
Visit the EJF website www.ejfoundation.org
Water pollution
Greenpeace campaigner Martin Hojsik (coordinator of the Toxics Water
Pollution Project) sums up the organisation’s recent report on toxic water
pollution by factories producing sportswear in China.
As much as 70 percent of China’s rivers, lakes and reservoirs are affected by water
pollution, and the clothing industry is making matters worse by pouring hazardous
chemicals into the mix.
A year-long Greenpeace investigation into toxic water pollution in China uncovered
links between a number of major clothing brands,1 including Adidas and Nike, and
suppliers in China which were found to be discharging persistent and bioaccumulative
hormone disruptors into Chinese rivers. The findings from the research provide a
snapshot of the kind of toxic chemicals that are being released by the textile industry
into waterways all over the world, and are indicative of a
much wider problem that is having serious and far-reaching
consequences for people and wildlife.
Greenpeace have demanded that:
This is a global problem that requires global solutions. As
• Companies establish policies that commit to shift from
brand
owners, Nike, Adidas and other multinational companies
hazardous to safer chemicals, accompanied by a plan of
are
in
the
best position to influence the environmental impacts
action with clear and realistic timelines
of
production
and to work together with their suppliers to
• These policies to be based on a precautionary approach
eliminate
the
release
of all hazardous chemicals from their
to chemicals management, and account for the whole
production processes and their products. These companies
product lifecycle
need to take responsibility for the use and release of persistent,
• Companies make the data about which chemicals their
hormone-disrupting chemicals into our critical and life suppliers use and release publicly available
sustaining waterways and use their influence to become
champions for a toxic-free future.
Ethical Consumer is supporting Greenpeace in its call for
www.greenpeace.org/international/en/campaigns/toxics/
companies to implement chemicals policies that apply to
water/detox/?thingstodo.
the entire manufacturing process. For this buyers’ guide, we
have not rated companies on their chemicals policies, but
our next clothing buyers’ guide (in approximately two years)
will expect progress towards Greenpeace’s demands, above.
References 1 The list of the clothing and sportswear brands is at http://www.
greenpeace.org/international/en/publications/reports/Dirty-Laundry/
Images: Greenpeace campaigners takes samples to investigate water
pollution from sportswear factories in China
15
Clothes
Support the
little guy
e
v
i
t
a
n
Alter
Politics
+ve
e
2
e
16.5
h
People Tree [F & O]
16
H
Traidcraft [F & O]
16
H
BTC [F]
15.5
h
THTC [O]
15.5
BTC [F & O]
Company Ethos
Anti-Social Finance
Political Activity
Boycott Call
Genetic Engineering
• Company Ethos:
17
Liv [F &O]
USING THE TABLES
Workers’ Rights
People
Human Rights
Animal Rights
Factory Farming
Animal Testing
Animals
Pollution & Toxics
17
= middle rating,
empty = top rating
(no criticisms).
Climate Change
Gossypium [F & O]
= bottom rating,
BRAND
H
h
Nuclear Power
Environment
USING THE TABLES
categories.
g
Clothin
e
e
e
e
E
e
E
= full mark,
= half mark.
marks.
COMPANY GROUP
Vericott Ltd
2
Elysia
2
Bishopston Trading Co
2
People Tree Fair Trade Group
2
Traidcraft plc
1
Bishopston Trading Co
1
Eco-T Ltd
Annie Greenabelle [F or O]
15
1
A G Organics
Frank & Faith [O]
15
1
Frank & Faith Ltd
Frank & Faith
14
Komodo [O]
15
People Tree [F]
15
H
Traidcraft [F]
15
H
Annie Greenabelle [S]
14.5
Greenfibres [O]
14.5
THTC
14.5
Komodo
14
Lowie [O]
14
Frank & Faith Ltd
e
The Yakit Rackit
1
People Tree Fair Trade Group
1
Traidcraft plc
0.5
h
E
A G Organics
1
Greenfibres Ltd
Eco-T Ltd
The Yakit Rackit
1
H
13.5
Greenfibres
e
1
h
e
Bibico [F]
13
Lowie
13
Jackpot [O]
11
H
h
H
h
h
Earth Collection [O & eco]
10
H
h
h
h
H
Jackpot
10
H
h
H
h
h
Kuyichi [O]
10
H
h
H
h
h
H
h
Earth Collection [eco]
9
H
h
h
h
H
H
h
Kuyichi
9
H
h
H
h
h
H
Edun [O]
6
H
h
H
h
H
h
H
H
h
h
h
Edun
5
H
h
H
h
H
h
H
H
h
h
h
H
h
H
h
Bronwyn Lowenthal
Greenfibres Ltd
1
Bibico
Bronwyn Lowenthal
H
1
h
H
h
h
1.5
IC Company
Austral Yarns/C E Dickinson
IC Company
h
1
h
0.5
h
h
1
h
h
Kuyichi International
Austral Yarns/C E Dickinson
h
Edun Apparel/LVMH
Edun Apparel/LVMH
Alexon also own Dash, Eastex, Kaliko and Minuet Petite. N brown also own Jacamo and Simply Be. LW corp also own Additions Direct, Choice, K&Co and Very.
[F] = Fairtrade [O] = Organic [E] = Environmental features [S] = Sustainability features [eco] = EU Flower Ecolabel
16
Buyers’ Guide
With public awareness of ethical issues on
the high street at an all-time high, more
and more clothes-lovers are trying their
hand at DIY. If you disagree with the fast
fashion business model, why not arm
yourself with the skills to make clothes
yourself, and liberate yourself from the
sheep-like trends of the fashion world?
The best way to learn is to just get stuck
in. But if you don’t have the kit, or are a
bit nervous, there are now a huge array of
courses available in independent venues
all over the UK, which cater for all abilities
and cover subjects as diverse as dyeing
clothes with seasonal plants (Here Today,
Here Tomorrow), zip and button-hole
sewing, knicker-making and more. Better
still, many of these venues ply you with
delicious food and drink while you learn
– some including alcohol, but watch those
fingers!
Courses
Here is just a small selection of the
workshops and courses available:
Drink, Shop, Do (London)
www.drinkshopdo.com 0203 343 9138
Here Today, Here Tomorrow (London)
www.heretodayheretomorrowblog.
wordpress.com
The Makery (Bath) 01225 421175
www.themakeryonline.co.uk
The School of Sewing (Leicestershire)
www.schoolofsewing.co.uk 01530 416300
i c al c
Y
e th
azine
The rise and rise of the
refashionista
ume
s
rm
Little Owl Creations
on
(Warwickshire) www.
The brands covered
littleowlcreations.co.uk
on this table are by no
means the only ethical
Stitched Up
BE
offerings
out there.
(Manchester)
S T BU
The Guardian’s Ethical
www.stitchedupuk.
Fashion Directory lists
blogspot.com
many more brands on offer.
World of Rags to Bitches
Also, ethical e-tailers, particularly
(Manchester) 07708 093 083
www.fashion-conscience.com,
www.rags-to-bitches.com
offer a wide range of ethical
If sewing isn’t your thing,
brands, although only for women
skills like knitting, crochet and quilting are
I’m afraid, fellas. See the Best Buys
all enjoying a resurgence. Stitch ‘n’ Bitch
in our e-tailers buyers’ guide (page
is a worldwide community of knitting
26) for unisex ethical clothing.
groups. Find one near you or set one up
and register it at www.stitchnbitch.org.
Eligible for the Best Buy label are
There are bound to be similar events in
all brands scoring 13 or higher
your area.
on the table; Gossypium, Liv,
If you already have plenty of sewingBishopston Trading, People Tree,
based skills, why not set up your own
Traidcraft, Annie Greenabelle,
social event or workshop? They’re a great
Frank & Faith, Komodo, THTC,
way to meet people and share skills.
Greenfibres, Lowie, and Bibico.
Ecomodo provides a platform for you
to lend and borrow each other’s everyday
objects, skills and spaces such as sewing
machines or knitting classes
17
17
www.ecomodo.com.
School of Everything helps you find
local teachers, lessons and classes in all
subjects, including sewing, and you can list
yourself too. www.schoolofeverything.
com.
17
More of an online socialiser? You can
share your clothing refashion projects with
an online community from around the
world at Burdastyle.com and Refashioncoop.blogspot.com is another online
Guardian Ethical Fashion Directory
community for sharing sewing skills,
www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/page/
patterns, or finished garments.
ethicalfashiondirectory
ag
M
ost of the companies
on the table opposite
are small, familyrun businesses who have close,
long-standing relationships
with their suppliers. Some
of them are organic and
Fairtrade pioneers, without
whose dedication, years ago,
we wouldn’t be able to buy
such niche products in our
supermarkets today. Although
organic and Fairtrade products bought
from big chains are a good next-best
option when you need something in a
hurry, we would always suggest that you
support these small businesses first. Their
entire business models are often created
around the desire to do business better.
Meanwhile, supermarkets et al are based
on the stack-em-high-sell-em-cheap
model, which is unsustainable to its very
core. See page 18 for Ruth Rosselson’s
article on the transience of fast fashion.
Swap and charity shop
As always, we’re recommending eBay,
charity shops and ‘swishes’ (clothes swaps
– of which there are now many), as a
cheap, sustainable alternative to shopping
for new clothes.
Find something near you with these
handy websites:
www.swishing.org
www.bigwardobe.com
www.charityshops.org.uk/locator.php
(also available as an iPhone app)
Other links
Ethical Fashion Forum
www.ethicalfashionforum.com
a one-stop-shop for information on the
issues surrounding the clothing industry
eBay www.eBay.co.uk
E-How www.ehow.com
video tutorials for just about anything
Company profiles
Edun is a brand set up by U2 vocalist
Bono and his wife, with the aim of
increasing trade with Africa. LVMH,
a huge designer wear and wines and
spirits company, bought a 49% stake
in the company in 2009. As a result,
Edun’s score drops from 14.5 when we
last rated it, to 5 (or 6 with the positive
product sustainability mark for their
organic products). This is due to LVMH’s
negative marks across most of our ratings
categories.
Kuyichi and Earth Collection fail to
fulfil Ethical Consumer’s more extensive
requirements for larger companies on
environmental and social reporting,
hence their lower positions on the table.
17
Clothes
Ethical fashion
Ruth Rosselson asks is it ever possible?
W
hen Ethical Consumer first
started covering ethical
clothing, there were just
a few UK-based companies making
or marketing their clothes under the
umbrella of ‘ethical fashion’. Those that
were producing ethical garments were
often criticised for having a very narrow
appeal. Few of the brands designed and
sold clothes that could be described as
fashionable.
Fast forward to 2011 and it’s a
completely different story. As we’ve
become more aware of the ethical issues
within the supply chain, more and more
companies are producing, designing, and
selling ‘ethical fashion’. Meanwhile, the
profile of ethical fashion grows year-onyear as a variety of celebrities, models and
actors take up the cause. London Fashion
Week even has its own ethical fashion
showcase, Esthetica.
While it’s positive that there are more
options available for the concerned
consumer, there’s something fundamental
that this trend fails to address: fashion is
an industry that thrives on transience,
consumption and disposability.
The fashion industry’s survival
and success is down to one main
concept: fashion styles come and
go. What’s ‘in’ this autumn, will
probably be ‘out’ next autumn,
requiring you to buy a whole
new wardrobe – whether
or not you need one.
The rise of fast fashion
has meant that this
turnover happens
more rapidly than
ever before.
For ethical
fashion companies
to directly
compete with the
high street, they
need to buy into the
idea that fashions
will change from
season to season,
and year to year. But
can a company really
call itself eco-friendly,
18
sustainable or ethical if it’s still trying to
shift a whole new season of clothes every
few months? Can it really call itself ethical
if its clothes are so on-trend that no one
will want to wear them this time next year?
Or even this time next month? It’s a tricky
business.
The Ethical Fashion Forum has a list
of criteria for ethical fashion. However,
although it addresses environmental,
sustainability and animal rights issues,
there is not a criterion for whether clothes
are designed to be durable – in both
manufacture AND design. The
fact is that ethical fashion is an
oxymoron. If it’s ‘fashionable’,
then almost by definition
it’s transient and disposable
(unless that style comes back
in fashion).
There are a number
of companies
producing
ethical
clothing which
concentrate
on producing
classic styles,
stylish clothes
and staples.
Perhaps the
way forward
is to throw
out the idea
of ‘fashion’
altogether,
and develop
instead a
discourse around
‘style’, which is
something that is more enduring than
transient? Perhaps new terms altogether
are needed?
Whatever we decide to call it, ethical
designers need to consider the longevity
of their designs – as well as the durability
of the garments – so that they’re wearable
season after season, year after year.
Ruth Rosselson is a freelance
writer and editor http://
RuthRosselson.net and
tweets from
@RuthRosselson.
Above: Last years’ fashions at
the Esthetica ethical fashion
showcase.
Left and right: Always in
fashion – truly ethical fashion
from Gossypium.
© British Fashion Council
and Gossypium
Buyers’ Guide
Why wool is
my fibre of
choice
Beate Kubbitz runs
designer label Makepiece,
which uses wool from her
own flock, and is knitted
within the community in
Calderdale.
S
heep which are extensively farmed
(i.e. outdoors) on a hillside in
the UK experience general peace
and tranquillity. There are rules and
regulations on welfare and the inputs, and
impacts on wildlife are relatively low. Even
non-organic sheep rearing isn’t intensive
in the way other mainstream farming (like
chickens and pigs) is.
My sheep are Shetlands – a small,
almost feral-looking sheep, which is
often used for conservation grazing. I
try to farm with low inputs. Making hay
provides the majority of the winter feed
so I don’t have to source much additional,
non-local foodstuff.
There are few suppliers of ‘vegetarian
wool’, where the sheep are never involved
in meat production. My sheep are dual
purpose, so as well as their wool being
suitable for knitwear, the majority of
my lambs will be sold for specialist meat
(they’re a slow growing breed so they have
longer lives than conventional butchers’
lamb).
Due to a long-term decline in wool
price, for economic reasons farmers have
concentrated less on breeding for a fine
fleece. Other UK breeds still produce
fleece for fancy yarns and clothing but
even rough fleece is useful in carpets,
futon fillings and in insulation where it’s
naturally fire resistant – and renewable.
The recent interest in wool has gradually
pushed up the price of fleece and this
should re-engage farmers with fleece
qualities in their sheep.
For me, wool as a by-product of
farming for food is a plus – you’re not
using land that could be producing food
or textiles. However, it shouldn’t be
ignored that sheep are CO2 emitters and
while in the right place they can be used
for conservation grazing, in the wrong
place they can cause soil erosion. It’s a
personal choice, but I wouldn’t place wool
ethically below petrochemicals or energy
and solvent intensive plant fibres just
because sheep are eaten.
Beate suggests you look out for organic
wool, and the British Wool Trademark
(which means the wool has been locally
farmed and probably been spun in the UK
or Europe). www.makepiece.com, 01706
815888.
Mini Mills
Going local – Pamela Ravasio traces the journey from sheep fleece
to designer knitwear.
I
t is old news that the wool industry in Britain and across Europe is a shadow of its former self. British
breeders are in fact caught between a rock and a hard place. On the one hand, the price paid for each fleece
by the British Wool Marketing Board is but a token and hardly, if at all, covers the costs1 incurred for shearing
or transport. On the other hand, it is against the law for breeders to simply dispose of wool as they please - the
most cost efficient way usually means burning or burying it.2 It also has to be recognised that most British
sheep are not bred for their wool but for their meat and as such, some of the wool is not the quality required for
high-end fabrics.
Yet although the European ‘big wool industry’ has probably been lost for good to other countries further
east, the tide has started turning and breeders and producers are starting to take charge of their wool’s fortune
again. In the course of the past two or three years a trend has emerged and changes to the British and European
wool landscape have become palpable. As a direct consequence, small mills - or ‘mini mills’ - are cropping up
across Europe, and their minimum quantities for processing can be as low as a single fleece. Some guarantee full
traceability down to the individual sheep, others ‘only’ down to the flock.
The British and European wool industry, in short, is slowly recovering some of its former glory and
production capacity. The markets the mills are catering to are the breeders of small rare breed flocks, as well as
crafts people and designers committed to buying local. With waiting lists as long as nine months the mills are
evidently in high demand!
Pamela Ravasio is an ethical fashion journalist and consultant, and the publisher of the Award winning eco fashion
Blog ‘Shirahime’. (http://shirahime.ch).
Woolfest is a
celebration of
natural fibres,
especially all
aspects of wool,
wool products
and wool crafts.
To find out
more, visit www.
woolfest.co.uk
References
1 http://www.
timesandstar.co.uk/
news/farming/farmersthreaten-to-burn-wool1.6160?referrerPath=news/
farming 2 http://www.
britishwool.org.uk/about.
asp?pageid=17)
19
Clothes
Miamo’s story
This is the story of Miamo, one of the thousands who cross the
border from Burma to Thailand every year looking to earn a
decent living and send some money back to their families and
who end up working in the sweatshop conditions of Thailand’s
garment industry. For more information of migrant workers in
Thailand visit www.mapfoundationcm.org
“I knew that the wages would be very low, but I hoped that
maybe they would increase if I worked hard. I started in a
knitting factory earning about 70 baht a day. After five years I
now earn 90 baht a day, still only half the legal minimum wage.
The factory makes deductions from our wages for the living
quarters (we stay in large dormitories with only a mat for a
bed), for electricity and for food. In high season we regularly
work 10 hours a day, and only after that 10 hours do we get
paid any overtime. The owner keeps our work documents so
we don’t go outside because without documents we could be
arrested.
After we learned about our rights,
we tried to negotiate for proper wages
and better conditions but the factory
owner threatened to call immigration
and have us deported. One day, however,
the factory foreman beat one of the
workers and we could no longer tolerate
the conditions so we went on strike. It
was very frightening because the factory
called in the police but we stood our ground. We were nearly
all deported but we managed to get some support from media
coverage and from NGOs. Eventually an agreement was made.
We would get clean water supplies for showering, the number
of toilets would be increased and overtime would be paid at a
better rate, but our daily wages remained the same! The leaders
of the strike did not dare go back to work for fear of retribution
and they could not get a job in Mae Sot as the employers had
blacklisted them, so they had to use brokers to take them to
work in other areas of Thailand.”
© Labour behind the label, www.flickr.com
Case study provided by the MAP Foundation
Getting Britain making things again
A new clothing factory in the UK
owned and run by its workers –
Giles Simon from Co-operatives
UK reports.
Over the last twenty years there has been a
slow decline in the British manufacturing
industry. But with rising energy costs and
a growing interest in buying local, there
seems to be a turn amongst consumers
– individuals and businesses – towards
buying UK manufactured products.
Riding the wave of this interest is
Midshires Clothing, one of a relatively
small number of UK clothing and garment
manufacturers.
Based in Kettering, Northamptonshire,
Midshires Clothing is even more unusual
because it is a worker co-operative, a
business owned and run by its employees.
The factory was established last year
by workers from a former garment
manufacturer in the area and people from
a nearby worker owned co-operative,
Brightkidz, which supplies high visibility
clothing to schools and local authorities.
Alison Holland, a founder member of
both Brightkidz and Midshires Clothing,
says “Brightkidz was looking for a UK
manufacturer for its products, but couldn’t
find any that could provide what we
needed. Then the opportunity of opening
a factory with local workers came up and
we jumped at the chance.”
The co-operative is developing its range
of products. Many it produces directly
20
for BrightKidz, primarily high visibility
clothing for children and cyclists. In
addition, it manufactures workwear and
specialist garments for the healthcare
sector.
Recent work – which demonstrates
how co-operatives are often the first to
support one another – includes producing
bags for Lincolnshire Co-operative, a large
customer owned co-operative in the East
Midlands; and shirts for the Woodcraft
Folk, the participative, co-operative
movement for young people.
Because of its unique nature, Midshires
is also branching out into manufacturing
for a small number of ethical fashion
labels. As Alison says, “As a UK based
business with our workers in full control
of the business and the profits, we see
ourselves as one of the most ethical
garment manufacturers
in the business.”
The close
relationship between
Brightkidz and
Midshires has its
advantages. Not only
does it allow Brightkidz
to produce clothing
it needs quickly but,
because they are now
based next door to
one another, they can
co-operate with one
another.
Midshires is a new and growing
enterprise that Alison rightly thinks
is part of a bigger picture: “The great
thing is that there is a history of garment
manufacturing in Kettering and around,
so there have always been people with
skills but without any jobs. We can now
start to offer people jobs and play a small
role in getting Britain making things
again.”
There are a small but growing number
of UK based manufacturers who are
beginning to benefit from a change in
how people want to shop. What makes
Midshires Clothing nearly unique is that
it’s a UK clothing manufacturer where the
workers don’t just have a job: together they
own and run the business.
www.midshiresclothing.co.uk
Midshires Clothing – Lyn Hope (front), Alison Holland
and Francis Panther. © 2011 Paul J Lashmar
Buyers’ Guide
Cowboy
denim
© Lu Guang / Greenpeace
Heather Webb looks at
the impacts of jeans on
the environment.
A
ccording to New Internationalist,
jeans are the Coca-Cola of
clothing.1 They are a staple of most
people’s wardrobe. Yet the production
of jeans has devastating impacts on the
environment, and controversy often
surrounds how they are made and the
working conditions of those who make
them.
During the eighteenth century, as
trade, slave labour, and cotton plantations
increased, so did the use of jeans. Workers
in America wore it because the material
was strong and it did not wear out easily.
The cloth was dyed with indigo taken from
plants in the Americas and India, turning
it into its trademark dark blue colour.2
Throughout the twentieth century
jeans continued to be worn for their
endurance and hardiness. Then in
1970, as new world trade regulations
relaxed restrictions on manufacturing in
developing countries, the production of
jeans soared. Cheap labour, and relaxed
environmental and health and safety laws
led to many of the traditional American
producers of jeans such as Levi Strauss,
Wrangler and Lees moving production
to countries such as Mexico, Bangladesh,
India, China, the Philippines, and
Thailand. While cheaper production led to
more jeans being produced and sold, the
impacts on the environment and workers
were often ignored.
One of the main environmental
impacts from jeans comes from the
cultivation of cotton. Despite the well
documented environmental and workers’
rights issues surrounding the cultivation
of cotton, many of the companies
producing jeans fail to state a policy
addressing their cotton sourcing.
Only one company in our jeans report
uses organic and Fairtrade cotton in their
jeans. Best Buy Bishopston uses Agrocel
Pure and Fair Indian Organic Cotton in
their jeans which are produced by workers
Denim washing factory in Xintang, China. Workers must search through wastewater to scoop out
stones that are washed with the fabric in industrial washing machines to make stonewash denim.
co-operatives in India.
Our other Best Buy, Monkee Genes, sell
some Soil Association Organic Standard
and Global Organic Textile Standard
(GOTS) certified jeans. Look out for the
jeans with the Soil Association logo next
to them.
Jackpot and Kuyichi use organic cotton
in some of their products although only
Kuyichi sells organic jeans. Both are
signed up to Made-By, which looks at
companies supply chains (see page 14
for more information). The Made-By
website also allows customers to track and
trace clothing items bought by entering a
product code on their website.
Water Use
Levi Strauss have started to address the
amount of water used during the life cycle
of a pair of jeans. A product life cycle
assessment conducted by Levi Strauss
found that on average a pair of jeans,
‘finished’ in large washing machines and
dryers, uses 42 litres of water.3
Using this information, Levi Strauss
made simple changes to its finishing
process which led to a reduction in water
consumption by an average of 28% and
up to 96%. The Water<Less jeans range
– which is due to come on sale in the UK
sometime this year - has over 1.5 million
pairs of jeans in its collection. Through
using its new waterless technique, Levi’s
will have used an estimated 16 million
litres less water.
Levi Strauss’s product life cycle also
highlighted that the after care of jeans
consumes large quantities of water. Levi
jeans now have after care labels suggesting
washing jeans less, on a lower temperature
and line drying.
Kuyichi will also be launching jeans
which use less water in its production in
its spring 2012 collection.
An alternative to water-intensive jeans
may be to purchase raw denim jeans. This
is where the jeans have not been washed
after being dyed during production. The
appeal of factory distressed denim is that
it looks similar to denim that has, with
time, faded. With dry denim, however,
such fading is affected by the body of
the person who wears the jeans and the
activities of his or her daily life. To achieve
the worn and faded look it is advised that
the jeans are not washed for six months or
more. Nudie sells raw denim and provides
details on how to achieve a worn look.
Finally, for those who do not want to
part with their loyal old pair of jeans, there
are several companies who offer to restore
or recycle jeans. The Denim Doctor (www.
denimdoctor.co.uk) offers customers
the opportunity to repair or restore old
pairs of worn out jeans. While www.
recycleyourjeans.com offers customers
the opportunity to get their jeans re-made
into a pair of sandals, for £45.
References
1 http://www.newint.org/features/1998/06/05/facts/
2 http://www.newint.org/easier-english/Garment/
jhistory.html 3 http://www.levistrauss.com/news/
press-releases/levis-brand-introduces-waterless-jeans
21
Clothes
Dying for Jeans
Sandblasting exposed by
Labour Behind the Label
and Heather Webb.
Politics
h
Nudie [O]
12
H
H
h
h
Nudie
11
H
H
h
h
Jackpot
10
H
h
H
h
h
Kuyichi [O]
10
H
h
H
h
h
H
h
Pepe
9.5
H
h
H
h
h
h
h
Levi Strauss Water<Less [S]
8.5
H
H
H
H
h
New Look
8.5
H
h
H
h
H
h
Uniqlo
8.5
H
h
h
h
h
H
h
Guess
8
H
h
H
h
H
H
h
Howie [O]
8
H
H
H
H
H
h
h
H
H
H
H
h
H
h
h
H
h
h
h
h
H
h
H
h
h
H
H
H
h
h
H
H
H
h
H
H
H
h
H
h
H
h
H
H
H
Levi Strauss
8
G Star Raw
7.5
H
Oasis / Warehouse
h
h
h
H
h
h
H
h
7.5
H
Gap 1969
7
H
H
Lee / Wrangler
7
H
H
h
h
h
H
H
H
h
H
Arcadia Group *
6
H
h
Calvin Klein
6
H
H
Diesel
6
H
h
H
H
H
H
H
h
h
Edun [O]
6
H
h
H
h
H
h
H
H
h
h
Marks & Spencer
6
h
H
H
H
H
h
H
h
H
h
H
h
Anti-Social Finance
Road Clothing
1
Svenska Jeans AB
H
H
H
H
H
h
H
H
H
H
H
h
h
Edun
5
H
h
River Island
4
H
3.5
0
h
H
h
H
h
H
H
h
H
H
h
H
h
H
H
H
h
h
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
h
h
H
H
Pepe Jeans S.L (Torreal)
h
h
0.5
Levi Strauss & CO
H
h
Fast Retailing Co. Ltd
Guess? Inc
h
h
h
1
VF Corporation
Levi Strauss & Co
h
G Star International BV
H
h
Arion Bank
h
Gap Inc (The)
h
VF Corporation
Next Plc
h
H
h
1
Ramsbury Invest AB
Philip Green
H
h
h
h
h
h
H
ASDA George
h
h
6
Primark
1
COMPANY GROUP
IC Company A/S
h
5.5
h
Bishopston Trading Company
1
h
h
H&M
Tommy Hilfiger
2
Svenska Jeans AB
h
7
H
e
= half mark.
marks.
h
6.5
H&M [O]
Political Activity
h
= full mark,
14
h
e
E
Company Ethos
Monkee Genes [O]
Boycott Call
Genetic Engineering
16.5
h
USING THE TABLES
• Company Ethos:
Bishopston [F & O]
Next
+ve
Workers’ Rights
People
Human Rights
Animal Rights
Factory Farming
Animal Testing
Animals
Pollution & Toxics
BRAND
Climate Change
= middle rating,
empty = top rating
(no criticisms).
= bottom rating,
H
h
Nuclear Power
Environment
USING THE TABLES
categories.
h
h
h
H
h
h
h
h
h
h
PVH Corp
h
Only The Brave SRL
h
1
Edun Apparel Ltd/LVMH
H
h
Tommy Hilfiger Corporation
h
Ramsbury Invest AB
h
Edun Apparel Ltd/LVMH
H
LFH International
h
H
h
Wittington Investments
H
H
H
Wal-Mart Stores Inc
* Arcadia Group includes Topshop, Topman and Burton.
[F] = Fairtrade [O] = Organic [S] = Sustainability features
See all the research behind these ratings together in a PDF of this report at www.ethicalconsumer.org. £3 or free to subscribers.
22
Buyers’ Guide
su mer m
Company positions on sandblasting
Companies
Action
Kuyichi, Pepe Jeans, Levi’s, New Look, Marks
& Spencer, Oasis, Warehouse, G Star Raw
Have publicly stated a ban on sandblasting within
their supply chain
Arcadia Group, IC Company, Tommy Hilfiger
Stated that sandblasting is not used in their supply
chain but have not issued a public ban on the practice
River Island, ASDA
Refuse to provide information on sandblasting
GAP
Old Navy brand sells sandblasted jeans
Primark, Diesel, Next, VF Corporation
Pledged that they will stop using sandblasting in the
future but have not issued a public ban on the process
ST
Y
e th
BE
Nudie Jeans stated that
sandblasting was being used in its
Italian factory. Labour Behind the Label
told Ethical Consumer that there were
challenges controlling supply chains which
meant that there were no guarantees that
unsafe abrasive blasting was not carried
out, even in Europe. Given the fatal risk
associated with this technique and a call by
Labour Behind the Label to ban abrasive
blasting throughout their supply chain,
Nudie loses half a mark in the workers’
rights category.
As Sam Maher of Labour Behind the
Label states, “The trend for Killer Jeans
must be phased out by companies and
rejected by consumers. Fashion to die for
doesn’t need to cost lives.”
Monitoring the ban throughout
supply chains will also be a challenge
for companies. According to Labour
Behind the Label: “Sandblasting is by
far the cheapest way to distress denim,
although there are other techniques
which create similar results, such as
chemical treatments, stone-washing,
hand rubbing, brushing or lasering.
This poses a further problem. When a
company takes steps to ban the process it
is likely to inform purchasing companies
that they cannot use sand any longer
and must switch to another of the
techniques, and the company should
increase their unit price accordingly. But
without proper monitoring of the switch,
it is highly likely that suppliers with
sandblasting equipment will continue to
use this and pocket the extra profit while
reassuring purchasing companies of their
compliance. Companies need to build
in regular monitoring to keep the ban in
place. Many of the companies which had
stated they would ban sandblasting have
said they would monitor this through
their current audit systems. However, none
The Best Buy is
Bishopston (www.
bishopstontrading.
co.uk)
organic and
BU
Fairtrade cotton jeans.
They are eligible for our
Best Buy label.
azine
J
eans - once seen as a symbol of the
American working class, worn for
its ability to stand up to the rigours
of building railways and mining – have
evolved from being solely for workers
into fashionable must-have items. Today
on the UK highstreet, most pairs of jeans
being sold will have had some treatment
to make them seem worn or faded. The
worn, distressed denim look, which was
achieved through hard manual labour, is
now recreated in factories.
Yet this look comes at a cost. Many
of the workers who create this distressed
denim look are liable to contract the fatal
lung disease silicosis. This is because sand
is blasted at denim using sand guns in
dusty environments, causing fine silica
particles to gather in operator’s lungs.
In Turkey alone, over 50 former
sandblasting operators are known to have
died as a direct result of silicosis caused by
denim blasting. In reality it is likely that
many hundreds more have suffered this
fate but have stayed beneath the radar due
to the hidden nature of the industry.
In March this year, Labour Behind
the Label launched a campaign to ban
the process, calling on all UK high street
retailers to publicly state their intention
to remove sandblasted denim from their
supply chains.
While many of the companies featured
in this magazine have already removed
sandblasting from their supply chain,
others are dragging their feet. Labour
Behind the Label is calling for these
companies to ban the practice with
immediate effect. This is because of the
high risk of workers contracting silicosis.
Those companies which have failed to
commit to immediately removing the
practice from their supply chain lose half
a mark in the workers’ rights category.
on
ag
r a distressed look
i c al c
16.5
The pop-art
inspired Soil
Association
jeans range
14
from Monkee
Genes (www.
monkeegenes.com)
are second best.
These are followed by
Nudie and Kuyichi
organic jeans which
are available in UK shops
10
and online.
12
of the companies contacted by Labour
Behind the Label have involved third party
or NGO assistance in monitoring the
removal of sandblasting from their supply
chains.”
How can I tell if my jeans
are sandblasted?
Sandblasting is common on the thighs
of jeans and around pockets but it is
virtually impossible to spot the difference
between distress achieved by hand
rubbing, or by some chemical processes.
This makes identifying sandblast-free
jeans in shops difficult. However, you
can choose to buy from brands who have
announced a ban on the process. A list
of UK companies who have and have not
banned sandblasting is available on www.
killerjeans.org for you to consult.
Many would ask why there is a need to
make our jeans look worn in the first place,
when the process can occur naturally. It
seems the trend to wear sandblasted denim
is the ultimate in fast fashion.
We, here at Ethical Consumer, feel that
making jeans look artificially worn in the
name of fashion makes no sense, especially
when the process used to achieve the look
costs lives. We would suggest that if you
want a worn or faded pair of jeans then
hold onto your jeans and achieve your own
personal touch or buy second hand jeans
from charity shops.
23
Clothes
Change is in the air
Now is the time to stand up for those who sew your
the International
Trade Union
Confederation (ITUC)
counted the killings of
trade union activists
around the world in
2010. It makes for
depressing reading.
The worst countries
appear to be Colombia
and Guatemala,
with 49 trade union
activists killed and 20
escaping assasination
in Columbia, and ten
killed in Guatemala.
Other murders
were recorded in
Bangladeshi garment workers demand better working conditions.
Bangladesh, Brazil,
El Salvador, Honduras, Pakistan, the
he past year has been a momentous
Philippines, Swaziland and Uganda. In
one for workers’ rights.
Iran a trade unionist teacher was hanged
Bangladesh’s garment-making
after a trial which violated basic standards
workforce, the majority of whom are
of justice, according to the ITUC.3 This
women, are commonly paid far less than
death toll represents nowhere near the
the cost of living. In December 2010
numbers of workers killed while quite
they were forced to take to the streets in
literally fighting for their right to be paid a
a series of protests against their working
decent wage.
conditions. Police and companies fought
It is imperative that companies with
back, turning peaceful protests into
purchasing power do all that they can to
violent battles in their attempts to quash
remedy this situation. Workers without
the uprising, leaving dozens of men and
access to trade unions are powerless,
women wounded and some dead.
but companies can use their position to
The Bangladeshi government has a
make a difference. For this reason, one
vested interest in keeping trade unions out
of the criteria in our newly-revamped
of garment factories, since the garment
supply chain management category is
industry produces nearly 80% of the
that companies engage with NGOs to aid
1
country’s total exports. Companies
workers in their access to trade unions.
are attracted by its highly competitive
And one of the best ways to get companies
prices, maintained by the pittance paid to
to act is through consumer pressure. See
2
workers.
the box for a list of campaigns you can add
The minimum wage was almost
your voice to.
doubled at the end of 2010. However this
fell short of the 5,000 taka workers and
their trade unions had been asking for and
only amounted to half of a living wage of
Child labour is a common problem
just over 10,000 taka, as calculated by the
across many countries in the garment
Asia Floor Wage Campaign.4
industry. However, a recent report by the
Centre for Research on Multinational
Bangladesh is by no means the only
Corporations (SOMO) highlighted a
place where such revolts have been
particularly disturbing incidence of the
occurring. Anti-union activity is rife
practice.5 Many young women and girls
throughout most of the countries which
produce our clothes. A recent report by
are recruited into the garment industry in
T
Sumangali Schemes
24
India under so-called Sumangali Schemes.
The Tamil word Sumangali refers to a
married woman who lives a happy and
prosperous life. Sumangali schemes sign up
female workers on three-year contracts, with
the promise of a lump sum of money at the
end, which the girl’s family often then use
to pay her dowry – still a general practice in
rural India, even though it was banned in
1961.
SOMO’s report revealed numerous
abuses occurring at four garment factories
in Tamil Nadu. The promised lump sum
is not an additional bonus, but is the girls’
wages, held back from them until they
completed their contracts. SOMO argues
that this makes it a bonded labour scheme.
And that’s if they’re lucky enough to see
the money at all – the report found that in
some cases the amount was cut short, or
even not paid at all. Having such leverage
over the girls, the three-year contract was
often extended over longer periods. Many of
the girls staying in hostel accommodation
provided by the company were only allowed
out of the compound once per month and
72-hour working weeks and mandatory
overtime were common.
Since the report was published some of
the factories concerned have taken steps to
address these issues, but there is still work to
do. SOMO urges companies not to cut and
run from suppliers found to be operating
Sumangali Schemes, but to use their
influence to improve the situation. Tirupur
People Forum (TPF) and the Campaign
Against Sumangali Scheme (CASS) are
working to eliminate this practice.
www.tpforum.in.
Workers’ rights campaigns
Labour Behind the Label (UK)
www.labourbehindthelabel.org
War on Want (UK)
www.waronwant.org
No Sweat (UK)
www.nosweat.org.uk
International Labor Rights Forum
(USA) www.laborrights.org/creatinga-sweatfree-world
Buyers’ Guide
r clothes, says Bryony Moore
There is another way...
Bishopston Trading is a clothing company with a difference.
In 1978 a group of residents of Bishopston in Bristol twinned
their community with the South Indian village of K.V.
Kuppam.
Their intention was to promote friendship and mutual
understanding between two very different parts of the world.
Several years later, Carolyn Whitwell, the group’s secretary,
received a letter from a village leader in K.V.Kuppam which
moved her profoundly. The letter thanked the twinning
committee for all their support, but made the simple
assertion that as skilled craftspeople the villagers wanted
work not charity.
With this in mind Carolyn set up the Bishopston Trading
Company as a means of providing employment for the
village of K.V.Kuppam by utilising the traditional handloom
weaving that was one of the major crafts of the area. Most
garment workers in the global South end up in sweat shops
in cities because they have to move out of rural areas to find
work. Alongside poor pay, this often results in housing issues,
with conditions in factory-supplied accommodation or
urban rented accommodation often being poor.
The Bishopston Trading project is specifically designed to
create secure and fair employment for the villagers using their
own skills and keeping them in their own community. The
company is a member of the World Fair Trade Organisation.
The clothes they sell, made with certified organic Fairtrade
cotton, provide
work for a team
of 213 cutters,
tailors, craft
workers and
hand finishers,
plus a further
260 handloom
weavers.
Workers enjoy a
‘provident fund,
retirement
gratuity,
sickness benefit
and health care’
and have been
working with
Bishopston
since 1985.
MAP Foundation’s work in Thailand
The MAP Foundation is a grassroots NGO in Thailand that
supports migrant workers from the surrounding countries,
particularly Burma. There are an estimated three million migrant
workers working in Thailand, both legally and illegally. Many of
these migrants are concentrated in the North along the border
with Burma. This is also the hub of Thailand’s garment industry.
Many of the garment producing factories, based in such towns
as Mae Sot, produce clothes for major transnational corporations
under conditions that would be illegal in western countries.
Cramped work spaces with little ventilation are common and
workers will work for up to twelve hours a day to earn a meagre
wage, often as little as 100 baht a day (£2). In many cases workers
will live in dormitories in the factories to save just enough money
to both live and send some home to their families. They often
avoid travelling outside alone for fear of arrest and deportation,
regardless of their legal status.
MAP works to raise awareness among migrant workers of the
limited rights available to them and to support them in fighting
for justice. Through workshops MAP brings workers together to
discuss conditions, learn about rights and justice, and develop
collective action strategies. Currently, MAP is developing a
campaign based around garment production. ‘Made by Migrants
for Export’ raises awareness among Thai garment workers of their
value to the global supply chain. MAP build on their experience
in the work place to develop strategies to combat ‘sweatshop’
exploitation. Working with groups in the west such as No Sweat
and Labour Behind the Label to foster international solidarity,
the aim is to present a united global front in the campaign against
exploitation in the garment industry that can then be transferred
to combat exploitation in other sectors.
Jay Kerr is an activist with the anti-sweatshop campaign No
Sweat in the UK, currently living in Thailand working with the
MAP Foundation supporting migrant workers.
Asia Floor Wage Campaign
The AFWC is calling for a single minimum living wage
figure to be paid to garment workers across India, Sri Lanka,
Indonesia, China, Thailand and Bangladesh. The campaign
aims to stop wage competition between garment-exporting
countries and halt the race to the bottom on pay.
References 1 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-10779270 2 http://www.laborrights.org/creating-a-sweatfree-world/sweatshops/news/11145 3 http://
in.reuters.com/article/2011/06/08/idINIndia-57559920110608 4 http://www.labourbehindthelabel.org/urgent-actions/item/843-bangaledesh_wage 5 Companies
mentioned in this report were: Deisel, GAP, Inditex (Zara), Marks & Spencer, Matalan, Next, Primark, Tesco, Timberland (owned by VF Corp), Tommy Hilfiger.
25
Clothes
Fashioning
the web
Bryony Moore explains how the fashion
industry is using social media and the web.
Nigel’s Eco Store [O]
Politics
+ve
h
= full mark,
e
E
Company Ethos
Anti-Social Finance
Political Activity
Boycott Call
Genetic Engineering
• Company Ethos:
e
2
Traidcraft plc
2
The Green Apple
e
14.5
USING THE TABLES
H
H
15
People
Human Rights
15
The Natural Store [F & O]
Animal Rights
Traidcraft [F]
Factory Farming
H
Animal Testing
H
15
= middle rating,
empty = top rating
(no criticisms).
Pollution & Toxics
16
The Green Apple [F & O]
= bottom rating,
Climate Change
Traidcraft [F & O]
H
h
Nuclear Power
BRAND
Animals
Environment
USING THE TABLES
categories.
Workers’ Rights
E-tailer
s
= half mark.
marks.
COMPANY GROUP
1
Traidcraft plc
2
The Natural Store
1
Nigel’s Eco Store Ltd
The Green Apple [F or O]
14
H
1
The Green Apple
The Natural Store [F or O]
14
H
1
The Natural Store
Fashion-Conscience [F or O]
Fashion-Conscience [Vg]
13.5
h
H
1
Fashion-Conscience.com
13
h
H
0.5
Fashion-Conscience.com
Ethical Superstore [F & O]
11.5 H
Ethical Superstore [F or O]
10.5 H
H
H
H
H
h
h
H
2
Spark Response Ltd
H
1
Spark Response Ltd
1
M and M Holdings
9
H
H
H
h
H
H
h
Ann Harvey
8.5
H
h
H
h
H
H
h
Alexon Group
Cotton Traders
8.5
H
H
H
h
h
H
h
Cotton Traders Holdings Ltd
M&Co
8
H
H
H
h
H
H
h
Mackays Stores Group
MandMDirect.com
8
H
H
Net-a-Porter [F or O]
8
H
H
ASOS [F or O]
7
H
H
Net-a-Porter
7
H
H
6.5
H
H
MandMDirect.com [O]
Ambrose Wilson
H
M and M Holdings
H
h
H
H
h
H
H
H
h
H
h
1
H
H
h
H
H
h
1
H
H
H
h
H
h
H
H
h
H
h
H
Net-a-Porter Ltd
ASOS plc
Net-a-Porter Ltd
N Brown Group Ltd
h
6
H
H
H
H
H
h
H
H
h
Grattan [O]
5.5
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
1
KG Atlas
Freemans [O]
5.5
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
1
KG Atlas
Grattan
4.5
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
KG Atlas
Freemans
4.5
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
KG Atlas
Littlewoods
4
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
La Redoute
3
h
H
h
H
H
H
H
H
H
ASOS
H
H
ASOS plc
h
h
LW Corp
h
h
PPR SA
Alexon also owns Dash, Eastex, Kaliko and Minuet Petite. N Brown also owns Jacamo and Simply Be. LW Corp also owns Additions Direct, Choice, K&Co, Very.
[F] = Fairtrade [O] = Organic [Vg] = Vegan
26
Buyers’ Guide
As recently reported on our clothes news
pages, Madrid-based online fashion
retailer IOU uses social media to provide
Virtual changing rooms
One of the perils of online clothes
shopping is not being able to try
things on before you buy them.
Although you can return items, the
return postage is often at your own
cost. Forum for the Future, looking
ahead to the future of the fashion
industry, predict 3-D body scanning
beaming into your bedroom in the
next 14 years.2 Until then, there
are a few options online for virtual
fitting, including www.fits.me and
www.mvm.com (My Virtual Model).
i c al c
on
su mer m
Y
e th
Best Buys for e-tailers
are: Traidcraft,
Nigel’s Eco Store,
BE
The
Green Apple,
S T BU
The Natural Store and
Fashion-Conscience.
Com.
Most companies on the other
tables in this special issue also sell
their clothes online.
azine
Ethical fashion and
social media
consumers with information on
where their garments come from,
enabling consumers to ‘follow the
journey’ of specific garments. It
also has a feature called ‘Trunk
Show’, whereby consumers can
promote
and sell the
company’s
garments via
their own social
networks, for a
commission.
ag
T
imberland is a great example of a
company which has leapt on the
social media bandwagon, with its
special site www.community.timberland.
com. On the Corporate Responsibility
section of the site, Timberland publishes
quarterly
indicators
and has a
forum where
stakeholders can
comment on its
performance.
In the Social
Networks
section,
consumers can
connect with
the brand via
existing social
media networks,
and the Blog,
written by staff,
keeps readers
up-to-date with
all the latest
news. This includes a blog by Jeff Swartz,
called ‘Rantings of a Responsible CEO’.
Here, the company also discusses various
environmental and social initiatives.
CSR International,1 a social enterprise
founded by Wayne Visser, promotes ‘CSR
2.0’, an evolved idea of CSR. It seeks to
create an online community of corporates
that report on progress against targets in
real-time and opens itself up to innovative
partnerships and greater stakeholder
involvement.
16
www.iouproject.
com.
And for
those wanting
to avoid buying
new, there are
plenty of social
media plugins
and websites to
help you on your
sharing way! See
page 17.
15
15
What does social media mean
for the fashion industry?
Web 2.0 facilitates the creation and sharing
of user-generated content on the web,
fostering participation and collaboration.
Social media, built upon web 2.0, does
the same thing, but exists purely for
communication purposes.
Many brands are now utilising these
new technologies to build their reputation
and relationship with consumers, with
almost every company now operating
a Facebook page in addition to its
usual company website. Blogs, keeping
consumers up to date with the latest
goings-on, are also a common feature.
This use of social media and web 2.0
has benefits for both consumers and
companies.
For companies, web 2.0 levels the
playing field – it enables small companies
to have equal access to marketing to
that of big companies, with viral videos
spreading across the globe within
hours. Added to that are the marketing
opportunities created by mass-collection
of personal data, which companies can
buy.
As consumers we have the chance to
become more involved, and be more aware
of what we’re buying into when we buy
a company’s product. It also creates the
opportunity for us to feed back directly
to brands, to either praise or express
disapproval at certain practices. The
14.5
13.5
visibility of this feedback, and the speed
at which it can travel to huge numbers of
people, means companies communicate
with consumers now in a different way.
This speed of communication gives great
campaign leverage.
A prime example of this is Labour
Behind the Label’s campaign against
sandblasting, ‘Killer Jeans.’ The campaign
group asked supporters to post messages
on the Versace Facebook page asking it
why it used the dangerous technique on
its denim. They did so in their hundreds,
and the company quickly deactivated
its Facebook page. A few weeks later
the company announced a total ban on
sandblasting.
Find out more about sandblasting in
our Jeans buyers’ guide on page 23.
References 1 www.csrinternational.org 2 Fashion
Futures 2025, Forum for the Future, February 2010 3
www.labourbehindthelabel.org, Accessed 29/07/11
27
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13/09/2010 13:49:47
Boycotts
Clothes
Window dressing for the occupation
The Palestinian Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions National
Committee (BNC) has called for a boycott of Swedish fashion
giant H&M in response to the opening of its second store
in Israel. The store is in Malha, a village in Jerusalem that
activists say was ethnically cleansed during the Nakba – the
‘catastrophe’ that accompanied the creation of the Israeli
state in 1948. Hundreds of thousands of Palestinians were
forcibly displaced, and villages such as al-Maliha (now
Malha) were destroyed or re-populated, their Palestinian
heritage denied or erased.
A press statement on the BDS website said that “ While
H&M is clearly not the only international chain that is
operating in Israel, its decision to invest substantially in Israel
after its criminal war of aggression on Gaza and in the midst
of its intensified colonization of Jerusalem in contravention
image source: www.survivalinternational.org
Tourist boycott of ‘human safari
park’
Survival is calling for tourists to boycott the main
highway in India’s Andaman Islands – an illegal road
which cuts through the land of the endangered Jarawa
tribe.
of international law can only be understood by Palestinians
and supporters of just peace around the world as a form of
support for Israel’s abhorrent violations of international law
and human rights.”
Read more at www.bdsmovement.net
Donna Karan ‘butchering bunnies’ again
The US animal rights group PETA has called a boycott of
Donna Karan because of its use of rabbit fur. PETA is asking
supporters to tell Donna Karan executives they will boycott
the designer’s collections until she stops using fur. A boycott
campaign was initially launched in December 2008 but
was halted when the company announced that its autumn
2009 lines would be fur-free and that it had “no plans” to
use fur in the future. The company has reneged and is once
again subject to a boycott campaign, under the banner
‘Donna Karan Bunny Butcher’, which will continue until the
company dumps fur for good.
You can email the company at www.dkbunnybutcher.com
Canada seafood
boycott making
an impact
Campaigners from Respect
for Animals say that the
boycott of Canadian seafood
is having a big impact. Since
it came into effect, the value of
snow crab exports from Canada to
the US has fallen by roughly $200 million a year.
Mandy Carter, Campaign Coordinator for Respect for Animals
says “We believe that the boycott is a significant contributor to
Newfoundlanders’ inability to sell seafood to markets at levels
they did in the past.”
India’s Supreme Court ordered the road closed in 2002,
but it remains open. It is highly dangerous for the Jarawa, who
number just 365. These hunter-gatherers have only had contact
with outsiders since 1998 and are thus at risk of infectious
disease from tourists. Campaigners say an epidemic could
decimate the tribe.
They also argue that the Jarawa reserve has become a human
safari park. According to Survival, tour companies and cab
drivers ‘attract’ the Jarawa with biscuits and sweets. They even
quote one tourist as saying ‘The journey through the tribal
reserve was like a safari ride as we were going amidst dense
tropical rainforest and looking for wild animals, Jarawa tribals to
be specific’.
Survival’s Director, Stephen Corry said, ‘We’re calling today
for all tourists to boycott the Andaman Trunk Road, which the
local administration has kept open in defiance of a Supreme
Court order nine years ago to close it. Despite the regulations
tourists are still invading the Jarawa’s territory, putting their
lives at risk... If the situation does not improve we will call for a
boycott of all tourism to the Andamans’.
You can find out more at www.survivalinternational.org.
Canada exports more than 80% of its seafood, and the
European Union is its third largest market. A boycott of
Canadian seafood several year ago by UK supermarkets
resulted in Canada stopping the hunt for some time. This, say
campaigners, is why the boycott is so important.
Respect for Animals was instrumental in achieving a ban on
seal products within the European Union, which Mandy says
“was a fantastic victory for seals” but that on on its own “will
not end the hunt, only economic pressure can now bring an end
to the slaughter”.
The seal hunt is undertaken by fishermen during the closed
fishing season and they earn less than 5% of their annual
income from sealing, with their main income coming from
the sale of fish and seafood products. Mandy says, “In simple
financial terms, ultimately protecting fishing income is more
important to the industry than carrying on with the small level of
income generated by the seal hunt, so the boycott makes sense.”
Public opinion polls consistently show that the vast majority
of people in the UK are strongly opposed to the seal hunt. A
recent poll showed that 79% of the British public want the hunt
banned.
Visit the campaign’s new website at www.boycott-canada.com.
29
Good technology
The Dark Side of Volkswagen
In June Greenpeace launched a new global campaign to
change Europe’s largest car maker, Volkswagen, and turn
them away from the Dark Side.
Volkswagen has been running an ad campaign showing a
cute kid in a Darth Vader costume turning on one of its cars.
Greenpeace has used the imagery in its campaign against
Volkswagen. According to Greenpeace, the symbolism of Star
Wars is far better suited to the kind of destruction Volkswagen’s
policies threaten to wreak on our planet, than to a fluffy advert
to sell more of its cars.
Despite the green image it likes to portray, VW is at the heart
of a group of companies lobbying against new laws which we
need to cut CO2 emissions, reduce our oil use and protect
places like the Arctic from climate change. Along with spending
millions on groups lobbying against the 30% greenhouse
gas reductions by 2020 target, VW is also opposing new fuel
efficiency targets.
Volkswagen was one of the driving forces in the lobbying
campaign against the introduction of vehicle efficiency
standards in Europe. It has also been part of efforts to oppose the
introduction of strong US standards. As the biggest car company
in Europe, with the biggest responsibility, VW must change and
support strong standards from now on.
Volkswagen says it wants to be: “the most eco-friendly
automaker in the world”, but only 6% of the cars it sold in 2010
were its most efficient models. It has the technology to do better.
VW must set out its plan to make its entire fleet oil-free by 2040.
The Volkswagen Group has more positions on the board of
ACEA (the car manufacturers’ association and one of the most
powerful lobby forces in Europe) than any other company.
ACEA has been leading the charge against strong fuel efficiency
standards in Europe.
© T_______ Boongird | Dreamstime.com
According to Greenpeace, for every ‘greener’ vehicle VW
sells, it shifts around 15 others which emit much more C02.
Volkswagen adds a huge price mark-up for its greener vehicles
– way above the cost of the technology – as it tries to cash in on
your green conscience.
Greenpeace is asking supporters to sign up to the Rebel
Manifesto which is asking VW to:
* Stop lobbying to oppose key European energy laws designed
to reduce our dependence on oil and publicly support the EU
target of 30% emissions reductions by 2020.
*
Publicly support the agreed vehicle efficiency fleet average
target for new cars of 95g CO2/km by 2020, and go further to
support even higher targets for cars of 80g CO2/km by 2020
and no more than 60g CO2/km by 2025.
* In line with this stronger target, commit to making significant
year-on-year reductions so that its average fleet emissions are
no more than 80g CO2/km by 2020.
*
Roll out full BlueMotion across its Volkswagen fleet and fit its
best efficiency technologies as standard across all other
brands, without increasing the weight or power of the
vehicles.
* Ensure the next best-selling Golf (VII) consumes less than 78g
CO2/km (3 litre/100km, diesel).
* Set out its plan to make its entire fleet oil-free before 2040.
Sign up to the Rebel Manifesto at www.vwdarkside.com and
view the full report – ‘The Dark Side of VW’.
Do mobile phones cause cancer?
The review, carried out by 31
international scientists from the WHO’s
International Agency for Research on
Cancer (IARC), led to the radiofrequency
electromagnetic fields emitted by
mobile phones being declared ‘possibly
carcinogenic’.
The debate goes on. A new review
of scientific evidence by a World
Health Organization (WHO) body
has reopened debate on the issue,
just a year after another report
appeared to have put it to bed.
30
The reclassification contradicts the
findings of a 10-year investigation into
links between mobile phones and cancer,
published in 2010. The Interphone study
of 13,000 people found no causal link
between mobile phone use and four types
of brain tumour, (although its authors
conceded their findings were necessarily
‘biased’ and ‘limited’, depending as they
did on participants recollections of their
mobile use over time).
But the new IARC report is not
emphatic: evidence was ‘limited’ for
the link with two specific brain cancers
– glioma and acoustic neuroma – and
‘inadequate’ for all other cancers. The
‘possibly carcinogenic’ classification puts
mobile phones into the same catch-all
bracket as coffee, dry cleaning chemicals,
chloroform and DDT.
The mobile phone industry has,
unsurprisingly, downplayed the findings.
Good technology
www.ethicalconsumer.orgSEPTEMBER/OCTOBER 2011
Domains of influence
The recent decision to free up the creation of new
Internet ‘top level domains’ (TLDs) – the final
bit of a web or email address, like .com or .org
– has attracted considerable media attention. The
regulating body ICANN has said that in the future
anyone can apply to create a new TLD providing
they have the right to use the proposed name,
and providing they pay $185,000. Currently just
22 generic and sponsored TLDs are approved by
ICANN – not counting the 250 or so ‘country code’
top level domains like .uk.
Domains are big business. The ‘.com’ boom around
the turn of the century led to a rash of speculation on
names – especially in the .com ‘namespace’. The new
arrangements could spark another ‘land rush’ with
wealthier organisations buying their own endings – such
as .tesco.
This is all a far cry from the early days of the Internet
when the TLD was seen as a way of identifying the type of
organisation using it. There’s still some remnant of that to
this day: non-commercial organisations tend to prefer.org
rather than .com, which originally meant ‘commercial’.
This notion – that the TLD said something about the
organisation using it – was taken further with the approval
of seven new names in 2000, They included .coop,
proposed by international cooperative bodies and Poptel,
a worker co-op ISP in the UK. Poptel also (unsuccessfully)
proposed creating ‘.union’. Like .coop, .union would
have said something about the values of the registering
organisation as well as its type.
An ‘ethical’ rationale was put forward by the sponsors
of .xxx – only reluctantly approved by ICANN earlier this
year. They argued that by clearly labelling and signposting
porn sites it becomes easier to prevent access by children
and to differentiate between legal and illegal material. This
is analogous to the argument for regulated prostitution
and decriminalisation of drugs: that since the industry has
always existed and always will, it is better to know where
it is and keep an eye on it. The counter argument is that
porn will continue to exist on other TLDs and .xxx is more
about money than ethics.
Arguably the refinement of search algorithms and
the spread of social media make domain names less
important. The danger with the new ‘open season’ is that it
could be another opportunity for some people to make a
lot of money without making it any easier for users to find
what they want on the net.
Electric cars
– green but not
yet affordable
Anyone buying an electric
car in the UK is eligible for
up to a £5,000 grant. Buyers can get a 25 per cent discount on
the price of nine eligible electric cars. However, with prices
upwards of £24,000, and that’s with the subsidy, electric cars
will remain out of reach for all but a few.
The government scheme has been running since the start of
this year but there is only enough money in the pot to subsidise
60,000 cars.
The nine eligible cars together with their current
scores live from our cars report on our website are:
Peugeot iON (10.5); Citroen C-Zero (10.5); Mitsubishi
iMiEV (9); Nissan Leaf (8.5); smart fortwo electric drive
(5.5); Vauxhall Ampera (5); Chevrolet Volt (5); Tata
Vista EV (3.5); Toyota Prius Plug-in (3.5).
Peugeot and Citroen were our Best Buys in that buyers’
guide. The Chevrolet, Vauxhall and Toyota will not be available
until next year.
The government’s climate watchdog has said the UK needs
to aim to have 11 million electric cars on the road by 2030 if it
wants to meet its targets for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
In addition, funds have been given to support the installation
of local charging points in the Midlands, Greater Manchester,
East of England, Scotland and Northern Ireland along with
existing ones in London, Milton Keynes and the North-East. It
is hoped a total of 4,000 charging points will be created by this
time next year.
Trials last year found that electric cars could fit with typical
driving habits, thus addressing the fear of ‘range anxiety’, that of
electric cars running out of power.
Results showed the majority of journeys were less than five
miles, average daily mileage was 23 miles and vehicles were
parked for 97 per cent of the time, typically overnight, allowing
plenty of time for battery charging.
Electric cars currently produce about 50 per cent less carbon
dioxide compared to petrol or diesel vehicles (because our
electricity is largely produced by fossil fuels). However, the
Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT) says these emissions
would decrease to almost zero if the electricity network was
switched from reliance on coal, gas and nuclear to offshore
wind and hydropower.
Financially, Citroen says the fuel cost
for its C-Zero is about 2p per mile
whilst a petrol car is about
11p. Electric cars are also
road tax and congestion
charge exempt.
Virtual Consumer is written by Shaun Fensom
who is a consultant and chair of Manchester Digital.
31
Public service fire-sale
Is this what you call
good service?
© Feverpitched | Dreamstime.com
As the government
goes on a fire-sale
exercise with our public
services in the name of
austerity, Simon Birch
and Tim Hunt ask:
How ethical are the
companies that will run
our public services?
32
T
here are many arguments against
the privatisation of public services
such as the creation of monopolies
and the lack of democratic accountability.
However up until now the environmental
and ethical track record of the companies
that are profiting from the privatisation of
public services has gone unnoticed.
In a groundbreaking piece of research
Ethical Consumer has put 20 of the
biggest of these companies under the
ethical spotlight, the results of which are
presented in the table opposite.
Disturbingly our research shows that
some of the companies lining up to take
a slice of the mushrooming multi-billion
pound public service sector are among
the most unethical in the UK and many
remain largely unknown to the public.
We’ve found that the biggest companies
that are playing an increasingly important
role in running our public services have
the bottom rating for many of our ethical
and environmental criteria, including
environmental reporting, supply chain
management, human and workers’ rights
and political activity.
RVICES
SE
OUR PUBLIC
The government is now selling our
public services to companies seemingly
without any scrutiny of a company’s
ethical or environmental policies. This
apparent policy vacuum challenges the
coalition’s stated claim that ‘this will be the
greenest government that the UK has seen’.
This is significant as it threatens to
undermine the progress that the previous
government had made in terms of its
ethical and environmental purchasing
policies.
Losing past gains
The government is itself a massive
shopper, every year spending around £200
billion on everything from coffee to new
canteens. The sheer scale of this spending
– or procurement as it’s called – has the
potential to have a major positive impact
on the market for ethical goods and
services.
The UK Government has now begun
to introduce ethical and sustainable
procurement policies with the result that
there are now targets on buying everything
from Fairtrade coffee to sustainable
timber.
However there is a very real danger
that because the companies buying
into the state sector have inadequate
environmental and ethical policies in
place, we will lose the ethics embedded
within the government’s own ethical and
sustainable procurement aims.
The companies we surveyed also scored
badly with regard to human rights, with
13 out of the 20 companies picking up the
bottom rating in this category.
Of particular concern are the
companies that run the government’s
immigration removal centres: G4S, Serco
and Sodexo.
As well as being responsible for
maintaining the UK’s nuclear weapons
through its subsidiary AWE, Serco - which
last year had a turnover of £4 billion
- has been criticised for conditions at the
Colnbrook immigration removal centre.
Government inspectors recently made
BPP
10.5 H
BUPA
9.5
H
United Health
8.5
H
KPMG
8
h
h
McKinsey
8
H
H
Vodafone
8
IBM
7.5
h
Atos
7
H
HP
7
h
Balfour Beatty
6
h
Alliance Medical
5.5
H
Ferrovial
5.5
h
Veolia
5.5
H
H
H
H
h
H
h
h
h
H
H
h
h
H
H
5
H
5
H
H
Sodexo
5
H
H
Serco
4.5
H
H
H
Capita
3
H
h
H
H
H
H
H
h
h
H
H
ISS
H
h
h
H
H
h
h
h
h
h
h
h
H
h
H
H
H
h
G4S
H
h
H
H
H
H
h
+ve
h
Company Ethos
Anti-Social Finance
E
H
h
h
Political Activity
Boycott Call
Genetic Engineering
H
h
Politics
USING THE TABLES
Animal Rights
Animal Testing
People
Workers’ Rights
11.5 H
10.5 H
Animals
Human Rights
Circle
A4e
Pollution & Toxics
BRAND
Climate Change
= middle rating,
empty = top rating
(no criticisms).
= bottom rating,
H
h
Nuclear Power
Environment
USING THE TABLES
categories.
Factory Farming
Company Ethos:
e
E
= full mark,
= half mark.
Product Sustainability:
marks.
COMPANY GROUP
Circle Holdings
H
A4e
H
H
Apollo Group Inc
E
BUPA
H
h
h
H
H
United Healthcare Corp
h
H
H
KPMG International
H
H
McKinsey and Co
H
H
Vodafone
H
h
Lenovo
H
h
Atos Origin S.A.
h
H
H
h
H
H
H
H
h
Hewlett Packard
h
H
H
h
H
H
Balfour Beatty plc
h
h
H
H
H
h
Dubai Holdings
H
h
h
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
H
h
H
H
H
H
H
h
h
h
h
H
H
h
h
h
h
H
h
Grupo Ferrovial S.A.
H
h
Veolia Environment
H
H
G4S
h
H
Goldman Sachs/FS invest Sarl
H
H
Sodexo
H
h
Serco Group plc
h
H
Capita Group plc
See all the research behind these ratings together with a PDF of this report at www.ethicalconsumer.org. £3 or free to subscribers.
191 recommendations to change current
practices at Colnbrook after reports of
poor conditions.1 There were also reports
of abuse at Serco’s Yarl’s Wood detention
centre which resulted in a number of
detainees going on hunger strike.2
Playing politics
The one category in which all the
companies bar three scored bottom rating
was political activity, something which
again, raises real concerns.
What we have also uncovered is an
embedded corporate culture of widespread
lobbying to gain access to Whitehall
power-brokers, donations to political
parties and a revolving-door policy of
former government ministers heading
straight into jobs with some of the
companies surveyed.
For example healthcare providers
Alliance Medical came under the spotlight
in 2005 when they were awarded a
controversial contract to supply scanning
equipment to the NHS after a company
which part-owns it, Bridgepoint Capital,
hired former Labour Health Secretary
Alan Milburn as an adviser.4 More recently
G4S were awarded a lucrative four year
contract just months after appointing
former Defence Secretary John Reid to a
£50,000 a year position offering ‘strategic
advice’.3
Paying tax (or not)
Another area that gives great cause for
concern is the evidence we have uncovered
that shows that 13 of the companies we
surveyed have subsidiaries in countries
that are widely considered to be tax
havens, something that is included in our
Anti-Social Finance category.
This implies that the companies
concerned, including some of biggest
names in the outsourcing industry such as
BUPA, Capita and Sodexo, are managing
their finances in such a way that they may
be actively avoiding paying tax here in the
UK.
Ironically, this June, Capita was
awarded a £100 million contract by the
Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency to
crackdown on vehicle tax and insurance
evasion.
The Tax Justice Network has also found
that global accountancy giant KPMG,
which had a $21 billion turnover in 2010,
itself uses 47 out of 60 global tax havens.
On its UK website the company openly
states that it is able to substantially reduce
companies’ tax bills through a series of
financial manoeuvrings.
Whilst our research has shown that
those companies who will profit from
33
Tax havens / avoidance
KPMG
Has presence in 47 out of 60 recognised tax havens
Capita
Jersey, Guernsey and Ireland
Sodexo
Costa Rica, Hong Kong, Luxembourg and Singapore
Serco
Singapore, Luxemburg and Ireland
ISS
Parent company FS Invest SARL is based in Luxembourg
G4S
Bahrain, Barbados, Costa Rica, Cyprus, Hong Kong, Ireland,
Luxembourg, Macao, Panama, the Philippines, Singapore and
the Virgin Islands
Ferrovial
Ireland, Uruguay and the Netherland Antilles
Veolia
Uruguay and Ireland
Dubai International Capital
Bahrain and Ireland
Balfour Beatty
Jersey
Hewlett Packard
Singapore, Luxembourg and Ireland
United Health Care
Hong Kong, Singapore, Cayman Islands, Bermuda, Costa Rica
and Ireland
Mckinsey
Ireland, Luxemburg, Bahrain and Hong Kong
BUPA
Guernsey and Hong Kong
BPP
Malta, Jersey and Guernsey
the latest round of sell-offs have an
alarmingly poor ethical record, Ethical
Consumer takes the view that even if the
companies involved were amongst the best
performing in the UK economy in terms
of their ethical record, we would still be
critical of the coalition’s dash to privatise
and outsource more of our public services.
We believe that profit-seeking
companies are unsuited to deliver
many public services and that there are
whole sections of the economy, such as
healthcare, which should be off-limits to
the private sector.
There are more than 100 stories behind
our survey. Here are just a few of them:
Atos is at the centre of a fierce campaign
run by disability activists. The French
company is responsible for carrying out
the government’s drive to assess everyone
claiming incapacity benefit and deciding
if they are fit enough to work. There are
8,000 tribunals hearing ‘fitness to work’
appeals every month across the UK
and 40 per cent of decisions are being
reversed.5
As well as being one of the UK’s biggest
companies Capita also has a well
documented record of poor service
provision. The company was sacked by
Lambeth local authority after tens of
thousands of unprocessed housing claims
left many families in danger of eviction.6
It has had similar problems in Manchester
and Blackburn.
In 2010 the Brook House immigration
removal centre run by G4S was described
as ‘fundamentally unsafe’ by Dame
Anne Owers who at the time was Chief
34
Inspector of Prisons. Dame Anne found
there had been 105 assaults, mostly
against staff and 35 incidents of self-harm
by detainees over a six month period.
There were said to have been serious
problems with bullying, violence and
drugs.8
Who’s running what
Construction and facilities management:
Balfour Beatty, Ferrovial, ISS, Serco
Custodial services: G4S, Serco, Sodexo
Health care commissioning:
KPMG, McKinsey, United Health
Information and communications
technology services: Atos, Capita, HP,
IBM, Serco, Vodafone
Local education authority outsourcing:
Capita, Ferrovial, Serco
Management Consultancy:
IBM, KPMG, McKinsey
Secondary healthcare:
Alliance Medical, BUPA, Circle
Tertiary education:
A4E, BPP (Apollo), Capita
Waste management: Veolia
The list of companies was compiled from
‘The rise of the public service industry’
published by Unison, and a list of the top
19 government contractors published by the
Cabinet Office.
former Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak
Global management consultancy
to disrupt activist communications
McKinsey was heavily criticised earlier
during the recent Egyptian revolution. It
this year by Greenpeace. The campaign
also attracted criticism for sending out
group claimed that McKinsey was giving
pro-Mubarak propaganda via its text
inaccurate and unethical advice to
messaging
countries
service.
such as
Vodafone
Indonesia
then faced
and Papua
a backlash
New Guinea
when it
which could
released
potentially
an advert
drive
suggesting it
deforestation
had helped
whilst
inspire the
allowing the
country’s
countries
revolution.
to generate
Protesters outside ATOS offices.
revenue from
new UNbacked forestry protection schemes.9
Paris-based multinational Veolia is subject
to a boycott call from the Boycott Israeli
Goods (BIG) campaign for its involvement
in Jerusalem’s new transport system
- one of its subsidiaries is a leading
partner in the consortium. According
to the BIG website the company was
‘directly implicated in maintaining illegal
settlements in occupied Palestinian
territory ‘.11
Telecom giant Vodafone has long been
criticised by tax-avoidance campaigners.
It has also been implicated in helping
References 1 Report on an unannounced full followup inspection of Colnbrook Immigration Removal
Centre and short-term holding facility. 16–27 August
2010. by HM Chief Inspector of Prisons. 2 www.
corporatewatch.org/?lid=3534 3 www.dailymail.
co.uk/news/article-1161911/Security-firm-landsMoD-job-months-John-Reid-joins-consultant.html
4 www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1490977/
Medical-company-linked-to-Milburn-in-rowover-care-service-scrutiny.html 5 www.bbc.
co.uk/news/10159717 6 www.guardian.co.uk/
society/2001/jul/02/ppp2 8 www.bbc.co.uk/
news/10582084 9 Bad Influence: How McKinsey
inspired plans lead to rainforest destruction.
Greenpeace April 2011 11 www.bigcampaign.
org/veolia/
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Accountants and Statutory Auditors
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Tax Justice
Corporation Tax Cuts
Corporation tax as a percentage of main UK taxes
The UK has had a corporation tax
since 1965 – prior to that companies
were subject to income tax just like
individuals. In the 2010 budget the
Government announced cuts in the
rate of corporation tax for bigger
companies from 28% to 23% in
2014-15, an unprecedentedly low
figure for the UK.
It is true that corporate tax rates in
some countries are lower than the UK
now: in Portugal 26.5%; in Greece 24%;
in Iceland 18%; and in Ireland 12.5%.
However, a tax rate of 28% is very close
to the average of comparable countries
to the UK in terms of GDP per head
of population, and below average for
countries of comparable size. Corporate
tax rates in Japan are 39.54%, the US
39.21%, France 34.43%, and in Germany
30.18%.2
There was, therefore, nothing
uncompetitive about a UK corporation
tax rate of 28% and so the changes will
make the UK a country which, for its size,
has a very low corporate tax rate.
15
/1
6
4
5
20
/1
/1
13
14
20
2
3
/1
12
20
1
/1
11
20
20
0
/1
10
9
/1
09
20
8
/0
08
20
20
7
/0
07
6
/0
06
20
20
5
/0
05
4
/0
04
20
3
/0
20
/0
03
20
/0
01
20
02
2
Furthermore, the whole basis on
which corporation tax is charged on UK
companies abroad has changed.
20
According to David Gauke, Exchequer
Secretary to the Treasury: “[A]s the
market-place has become increasingly
globalised, the UK has lost tax
competitiveness.”1
the proportion of tax receipts arising from
corporation tax will be falling. This will
be the result of policy, not a result of the
economic cycle. This is a change that is
without precedent in the recent history of
corporation tax.
A new way to pass wealth to the rich
The Treasury has announced changes to
the UK legislation governing how UK
corporations pay tax on their subsidiaries
registered in foreign countries.
According to the Government, the
changes are designed to: “strike the
right balance between improving the
competitiveness of the UK corporate tax
system and protecting the UK tax base
against avoidance.”1
There are three planks to this policy:
The amount that corporation tax
contributes to government coffers usually
follows the boom and bust of the business
cycle. In 2007-08 corporation tax raised
£46.38bn - in 2009-10 the figure fell to
£35.8bn.3
a) Cutting the tax rate of UK companies
Changes in the proportion of total tax
revenues provided by corporation tax are
shown in the graph above.
Under the new rules a UK
company that runs its internal banking
arrangements through a tax haven
subsidiary will benefit from a special tax
rate of just 5.75% of the resulting profits.
The dot.com crash and the recent
downturn explain the falls in 2001-2003
and 2008-2010. The forecast decline from
2011 onwards is, however, something
quite different: while the economy is
forecast to be in recovery over this period
the treasury will reduce by 75%. lt will
be easy to manipulate this to ensure
operating profits move for tax purposes
into such treasury companies.
b) Cutting the tax base of UK companies
i.e. reducing the amount of profit on
which they pay tax.
c) Increasing the use of tax havens by UK
companies.
That means that the obvious thing
for any company to do now is to shift
its internal banking arrangements or
‘treasury’ operation out of the UK and
into a tax haven.
As a consequence
Call on the G20 to end tax haven secrecy:
the tax rates on
www.christianaid.org.uk/ActNow/trace-the-tax/
the profits in
How tax can save us from the cuts:
www.neweconomics.org/publications/the-great-tax-parachute
Available from Richard’s Blog:
Manifesto for Tax Justice, Cuts: the callous con trick
Until 2009 UK resident companies
were taxable on their worldwide income,
as were companies incorporated
elsewhere but managed and controlled
from the UK. This made the system
completely compatible with income tax
for individual taxpayers (bar those who
were ‘not domiciled’ in the UK), who pay
tax on their worldwide income.
The UK has abandoned this system
and is now only subjecting the profits
of companies arising in the UK to tax
(aside from the 5.75% ‘tax haven’ rate).
This now makes the corporate tax
system fundamentally different from the
personal tax system for the first time and
creates a fundamental injustice in the UK
economy.
Previously the rules helped developing
countries collect tax from subsidiaries of
UK companies operating within them.
As all profits within the company group
were subject to UK tax, this reduced the
incentive to extract profits artificially
from developing world subsidiaries and
relocate them to tax havens, as the profits
would ultimately be taxed at full UK
rates. Under the new arrangements it
is clearly in UK companies’ interests to
seek to reduce profit in developing world
subsidiaries to as near zero as it can and
realise these profits instead in treasury
companies based in tax havens. As a
result there is a direct transfer of value
from the population of the developing
country to the shareholders of UK
companies. This is a matter of concern to
many of the UK’s development agencies.
The result is to pass wealth to the
richest from the poorest, both in the UK
and globally. £840 million a year will be
given away to large companies. Calling
this a measure to cut tax avoidance seems
to me the most Orwellian form of double
speak I can think of.
References 1 http://hm-treasury.gov.uk/press_68_11.htm
2 Corporate Tax Reform and Competitiveness, TUC, 2011
3 http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/stats/corporate_tax/corporation-tax-statistics.pdf
Richard Murphy is founder of The Tax Justice Network (www.taxjustice.net) and blogs at www.taxresearch.org.uk. Material has been edited
from Richard’s recent report for the TUC ‘Corporate Tax Reform and Competitiveness’ (available www.tuc.org.uk/economy/tuc-19619-f0.cfm).
36
Money
Business should
reveal pay
inequalities
Ethical and Green Funds
Ethiscore as at
23/11/09
5 year % growth
to 28/02/11
Aberdeen Ethical World OEIC
3.5
26.7
Aberdeen Responsible UK
Equity
3.5
15.35
AEGON Eth Corp Bd Fd OEIC
4.5
5.87
AEGON Ethical Eq Fund OEIC
4.5
24.48
Aviva Investors Sust Future
Absolute Growth
4
20.42
Corporate Bond
4
8.84
European Growth
4
21.17
Global Growth
4
7.29
Managed
4
13.33
Aviva Investors Sust Future UK
Growth
4
10.59
Aviva Investors UK Ethical
4
8.36
CIS Sustainable Leaders Tst
8
12.03
Ecclesiastical Amnity
European
7
36.57
nef is calling for businesses to adopt a new Charter of
Responsible Pay, which would include revealing the pay ratio
within a company on the front of its annual reports.
Ecclesiastical Amnity
International
7
67.51
“Transparency about pay ratios can begin to break open the
cosy culture of remuneration that benefits disproportionately
and counterproductively a tiny minority,” said Simms.
Ecclesiastical Amnity UK
7
12.56
F&C Stewardship Growth
7.5
0.23
F&C Stewardship Income
7.5
3.29
7
-6.22
First State Asia Pacific Sus
4.5
123.44
Halifax Ethical OEIC
3.5
23.1
Henderson Global Care UK
Income
5.5
3.18
Henderson GC Growth
5.5
27.36
Henderson GC Managed
5.5
17.07
Henderson Ind of the Future
5.5
29.4
Jupiter Ecology
7
23.64
Jupiter Environmental
7
5.87
3.5
12.33
Prudential Ethical
4
-16.2
Rathbone Ethical Bond Fund
6
12.84
Scottish Widows
Environmental
3.5
-14.7
Scottish Widows Ethical
3.5
-15.47
3
8.37
Standard Life OEIC
7.5
14.39
Standard Life Investments UK
Ethical Corp Bd
7.5
9.86
The Ratio
ecutive
Controls For Ex
Common Sense
ess
lising UK Busin
Pay And Revita
VIRXQGDWLRQ
QHZHFRQRPLF
Publicly listed companies
should have to justify high
pay inequalities according
to a new report, The Ratio:
Common sense controls for
executive pay and revitalising
UK business, published
by the new economics
foundation (nef).
The Ratio argues that
inequality in the workplace drives
inequality in society more broadly and cites research revealing
how high pay actually increases workplace inefficiency and
worsens the performance of top executives.
“The evidence is in: inequality is damaging to society and
high pay doesn’t improve performance at skilled work. In fact
it does the opposite, becoming a distraction to the complex
tasks of running a modern business” according to co-author
Andrew Simms. “So why do our top businesses keep pushing
open the gap between their highest and lowest paid employees?
Greater equality of pay at work is better for everyone, something
admitted even by the International Monetary Fund”.
The report can be downloaded free from
www.neweconomics.org/publications/the-ratio.
Action Aid: Tax avoidance “as big
an issue as sweatshops”
ActionAid have highlighted the reputational risks
of tax avoidance by multinational companies
in their new report ‘Tax Responsibly’, which
presents the business case for improved
taxation structures and practices.
The anti-poverty campaign group has recently
targeted brewing company SAB Miller for
dodging their taxes in Ghana, where it has paid no
corporation tax for several years. According to the
report, “The growing public interest in the taxation
of multinationals means that it is not tenable for
any government to impose or increase taxes on
ordinary people while there is a perception that
the burden is not also falling on businesses and
elites. Such situations in the past have contributed
to significant political instability in many
developing countries.”
Visit the ActionAid website to email SAB Miller
and tell them to Schtop siphoning profits out of
developing countries: www.actionaid.org.uk.
Fund name
Family Charities Ethical Trust
Legal & General Ethical Trust
Skandia Multimanager Ethical
Source: Moneyfacts.co.uk and Ethical Consumer Corporate Critic database
37
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Renewable Energy Association Member / Association for Environmentally Conscious Building Member
Ethical Consumer AGM
Ethical Consumer One Day Conference
Collecting Data
on Companies and Products
- the Potential for Civil Society Co-operation
Friday September 23rd 2011
Mechanics Institute, Manchester M1 6DD
Keynote Speaker: Ed Mayo (Co-operatives UK)
The Co-operative experience of web collaborations
Provisional Schedule:
12noon – 1pm
NGO experiences of information gathering and collaboration
Paul Roeland - Clean Clothes (Netherlands)
Chris Avery - (Business HumanRights - TBC)
1 – 2pm
Buffet lunch provided
2 – 2.30pm
New Technology, Co-operation and Crowd Sourcing
The Co-operative experience of web collaborations
Ed Mayo - (General Secretary Co-operatives UK)
2.30 – 3pm
Crowd-sourcing websites and ethical rankings - the US experience and data quality
Annesley Newholm (9 carrots/easyethical UK).
3 – 3.15pm
Coffee Break
3.15 – 4.15pm
Commercial Approaches
Ethical investment and consumer groups - the experience of international collaborations
Speaker TBC (EIRIS - The Ethical Investment Research Service)
Rob Harrison (Ethical Consumer)
4.15 – 4.30pm
Break
4.30 – 5pm
Future Collaborations
Ethical Consumer’s Open Database Project. Our plans for free access to Corporate
Critic Database for selected groups undertaking to add data in return. Other future
collaborations. What have we learned from today’s discussion? Panel discussion.
Speakers will speak for, on average, 20 minutes and there will be time for questions from the floor.
Attendance at the conference is free but participants must register beforehand. All are welcome.
Please email [email protected] with conference in the subject line
or write to ECRA at 41 Old Birley St, Manchester M15 5RE.
The conference follows ECRA’s AGM and formal business which runs from 10.30 to 11.30am
to which all shareholder members of ECRA are invited.
Collecting information on global businesses in fast-moving markets is a complex undertaking. How do new technologies and
co-operative values affect all this? What global collaborations have been attempted already? How successful have they been?
What picture of corporate behaviour have they painted? Can people agree what issues to track? How is all this financed?
What are the language issues? What plans are there for future collaborations? These and other ideas will be discussed
by the speakers and contributors from the floor. Meet the ECRA team and key researchers nationally and internationally.
The Mechanics Institute is a listed building best known as the birthplace of the Trades Union Congress which was founded
in the building in 1868. It is 5 minute’s walk from Manchester Piccadilly railway station.
39
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Climate of change
Carbon Fat Cats milking pollution
permits
challenging the advancement of coal as an energy source
in Scotland. An outdoor skill-share is planned for 26th-29th
August,in South Lanarkshire. outdoorskillshare.noflag.org.uk.
According to carbon trading think-tank Sandbag, ten steel and
cement companies have amassed free carbon pollution permits
with a market value of £3.5 billion. The European Commission
estimates that the sector, which is extremely energy intensive,
will have accumulated allowances worth between €2 and €7
billion by the end of 2012 under the EU emissions trading
scheme (ETS). National government over-allocation of permits
combined with economic decline mean that the steel, cement,
chemical, ceramic and paper sectors have been given many
more permits than they need. Rather than acknowledge that this
is nonsensical, these industries have lobbied hard against calls
to tighten the ETS. www.sandbag.org.uk.
Stop Expansion at Manchester Airport (SEMA) held its ‘Camp
at the End of the Runway’ in May, with plans to hold another
before the year is out. stopmanchesterairport.blogspot.com.
Value (€m)
ArcelorMittal
97.2
1,656
Lafarge
29.4
501
Tata Steel
23.1
393
ThyssenKrupp
19.9
339
Riva Group
16.6
283
Cemex
12.7
217
Holcim
12.5
213
Heidelberg Cement
12.5
216
Italcementi
8.9
151
Salzgitter
TOTAL
7.5
129
240.3
4,093
Camping against climate change
continues despite Climate Camp
hiatus
We’ve had a keen interest in the Camp for Climate
Action here at Ethical Consumer and have covered it on
these pages ever since its inception in 2006. We were
therefore intrigued to hear that the organisers of such a
successful tool for campaigning on climate change had
decided not to hold a Climate Camp in 2011. While the
initial reaction may be one of disappointment, closer
examination reveals that the decision not to hold a
camp this year was less about giving up and more about
making room for campaigning on climate change all
year round. Ethical Consumer takes a look at some of
the campaigns and action camps that have sprung up in
Climate Camp’s wake...
The Shropshire anti-coal protest camp at Huntington Lane
was set up in March 2010 to defend the site against UK Coal’s
plans to mine the area, which is set in thousands of hectares
of woodland in the heart of Shropshire’s beautiful countryside.
The company wants to extract 900,000 tons of coal from the
site, which will result in more than 2,430,000 tonnes of CO2
being released. In July U.K. Coal were granted a possession
order against the protesters, who are resisting eviction.
defendhuntingtonlane.wordpress.com.
Also campaigning to keep coal in the ground is Coal
Action Scotland, a support network for groups and individuals
Climate Camp Ireland will still go ahead this year but it
won’t be in a field. The aim is to beautify one of the country’s
approximately 2,800 abandoned housing estates and make it
into something useful for the people that live in its vicinity. The
insidious and wasteful local authority practice of running down
communities in order to buy up properties cheaply, only to tear
them down and turn the land over to property developers and
construction companies, inflicts untold damage, both human
and environmental, yet is little talked about.
www.climatecamp.ie.
What the frack?
Fracking is a new extraction technique allowing the exploitation
of the massive untapped reserves of so called ‘shale gas’.
Already big in the US, Cuadrilla Resources has bought it to
the UK with exploratory drilling near Blackpool. “Fracking”
– hydraulic fracturing – involves pumping water and chemicals
into the ground to force out the gas, which is trapped within
the ‘shale’ and so not extractable by conventional means.
Environmental problems caused by the controversial process
include water contamination and higher rates of air pollution
even than that of coal production. Camp Frack will be held
close to the rig at Singleton 17th - 18th September and will
include a day of action. www.campaigncc.org/fracking.
Reverend
Billy on the
Rampage!
Anti-corporate
evangelicals Reverend
Billy and the Church of
Earthalujah have been
busy causing chaos up and down the country with a UK tour that
included a bit of direct action every day. The tour climaxed with
a mass exorcism of the Tate to rid the London art gallery of the
evil spirit of sponsors BP. “BP Money is the Devil”, shouted the
Reverend as he was anointed with oil, flanked by gospel singers
and anti-tar sands protesters.
image source: http://www.artnotoil.org.uk/
images/20110718-d0212-2.jpg
Current Surplus
(Million EUAs)
Company
The campaign against Shell’s plans to build an offshore
pipeline in Rossport, Ireland continues. As we go to press
Shell to Sea campaigners had successfully halted work on the
construction of the Corrib pipeline for an number of days.
www.shelltosea.com.
The Ethical Consumer team were lucky enough to witness
Reverend Billy’s antics out and about on the streets of Liverpool
with a laying on of hands at HSBC followed by an exorcism
of Tesco.The Church’s performance the following evening was
tailored to local struggles, yet tied in with wider issues of climate
change and ecology. By the end of the night the entire audience
was on stage joining in, with all converted to the Church of
Earthalujah.
www.revbilly.com, www.no-tar-sands.org, www.artnotoil.org.uk.
41
Letters
org
www.ethicalconsumer.
EC131 July/August 2011
£4.25
Cutting down on
meat
way
What’s the greenest
?
me
ho
ur
to heat yo
Buyers’ Guides:
Boilers
Solar Thermal
Heat pumps
Plus:
ers
Gas & Electric Cook
Svalbard and
Jan Mayen
Islands
Greenland
Russia
Federatio
Sweden
Finland
Iceland
Faroe
Islands
Norway
Estonia
Latvia
Lithuania
Denmark
Ireland
Belarus
Netherlands
United
Kingdom
Kazakhstan
Poland
Belgium
Germany
Ukraine
Czech RepublicSlovakia
Luxembourg
Switzerland
Hungary
Romania
Slovenia
Croatia
Italy
Mongoli
Moldova
Austria
France
Bosnia
Uzbekistan
Serbia
Montenegro
Kyrgyzstan
Georgia
Bulgaria
Armenia Azerbaijan
Macedonia
Albania
Turkmenistan
Tajikistan
Turkey
Greece
Portugal
Spain
Chin
Cyprus
Gibraltar
Tunisia
Syria
Iraq
Lebanon
Afghanistan
Iran
Israel
Jordan
Morocco
Nepal
Pakistan
Kuwait
Algeria
Bhutan
Bahrain
Libya
Egypt
Western
Sahara
Saudi Arabia
UAE
India
Burma
(Myanmar)
Oman
Bangladesh
Thailan
Mauritania
Yemen
Niger
Mali
Chad
Eritrea
Sudan
Senegal
Burkina
Faso
Sierra
Leone
Liberia
Cote
d'Ivoire
Sri Lanka
Somalia
Benin
Guinea
Nigeria
Ethiopia
Central
African Republic
Ghana
Cameroon
French
Guiana
Uganda
Equatorial
Guinea
Gabon
Congo
Brazil
Democratic
Republic
of the Congo
Kenya
Tanzania
Angola
Malawi
Mozambique
Zambia
Madagascar
Zimbabwe
Namibia
Botswana
Swaziland
South
Africa
The world’s most
oppressive regimes
t
Our major new repor
I have been
thinking about
the issues raised
by Simon Birch
(“Changing Times”,
EC 131) for
some time, and
trying to reduce
consumption of
meat, fish and
eggs in my own
family. May I offer
you and Mr Birch
my suggestions?
The problem
Many people like the taste of meat,
and there is a presumption in
our society that a restaurant or a
hostess should offer large amounts
of meat to guests. What used to
be food for a rare feast, a roast
or steak, has become something
that people feel they ought to be
able to eat every day. And people
do not like being told that they
cannot have food that they know
other people eat. A few become
vegetarians, but most people would
resent being told to cut out meat
altogether.
Reduce, not eliminate
I would start by examining
scientific and medical publications
to find out what amount per week
of animal protein – meat, fish and
eggs – is the optimum for an adult.
I read that in the 1940s people in
Britain were healthier than before,
in part because the ration of meat
was 1lb per week per adult. (Those
who had before had less took their
ration, those who had had more
couldn’t get more.) So I set out to
reduce our family consumption of
animal protein to 500 grams per
adult per week. I did not count
milk, cheese and butter, because
to provide these the cow, ewe or
nanny goat is not killed. I know
that male calves, kids and lambs
are killed, but in the regime I
suggest a small amount of meat has
its place.
The method
I looked in old cookery books
and in ethnic ones. I found many
recipes in which the proportion
42
of meat was much smaller than
would be acceptable on a ‘roast
dinner’ plate. I also took from the
vegetarians the information that
a grain and a pulse at the same
meal provide complete protein. So
a pack of six sausages, in a lentil
and vegetable stew, and served
with rice, provides a meal for six
people. Many recipes, for stews,
lasagnes, pasta toppings, curries
and stir fries, can be altered to hold
less meat and more vegetables.
And if you want an 8oz steak at the
weekend, and are prepared to eat
more vegetarian food for the rest
of the week, that can be managed
too. So far, this regime has worked
in our house, with some effort at
planning from me, and I think the
meals are enjoyable.
I really enjoy reading Ethical
Consumer, and try to follow your
advice.
Mrs Alisoun Gardner-Medwin
Oppressive regimes
- surely not Cuba
I can’t believe that you have gone
off half-cocked again with a flawed
policy on oppressive regimes
(especially after the feedback from
the last review).
I have been a supporter of
ECRA from near its inception
but am extremely unhappy with
the sources used for and the
conclusions reached from the
survey.
CIRI is funded partly by The World
Bank and The National Science
Foundation plus various other US
based institutions.
Freedom House is based in the
US and has declared that it is
essential the USA leads the world
in “establishing democracy”.
As far as I can see The International
Centre for Trade Union Rights rates
Cuba as acceptable; also our own
Trades Unions in the UK give very
strong support to that country,
often exchanging visits with Cuban
worker representatives. Where does Cuban corruption
figure in Transparency
International’s reports?
The USA retains the death penalty
and is also involved in torture, and
is pretty repressive when it comes
to things like abortion and atheism.
So why are they not on the list?
Also the US maintains a cruel,
inhuman blockade of Cuba in spite
of there being numerous votes
at the UN demanding it be lifted
(supported by a massive majority
with maybe 2 or 3 opposing).
Cuba has education and medical
systems of which we would be
proud and yet you place them way
above such viciously repressive
regimes as Saudi Arabia.
If I had been doing this survey I
would most certainly have spoken
to our Trades Unions and others
who have actually visited Cuba.
Do you not realise that the rightwing idealogues in the US are
totally blinkered and cannot see
past the word “communist” - they
have been trying all sorts of illegal
moves, ever since the attempted
invasion at the Bay of Pigs, to
overthrow the Castro revolution
and you are assisting them in this.
If you can get this so wrong then
how can the other stuff put out by
ECRA ever again be trusted.
John Willis
Good to spotlight oppressive
regimes. Shame, however, to
use data from organisations like
Freedom House, who receive
80% of their budget from the
US Government and who state
“American leadership is essential
to the cause of human rights and
freedom”. Probably explains why
the USA does not feature as a
repressive regime despite being
responsible for disappearances
(rendition), extrajudicial killings
(Central America for the last
30 years), political prisoners
(the Miami 5), torture (Bradley
Manning, Iraq, Guantanamo,etc).
It probably also explains why
Cuba (no street children, no
disappearances or extrajudicial
killings, no torture, free health
and education) is listed as more
oppressive than Colombia, where
trade unionists, human rights
activists as well as indigenous
people experience high rates
Letters
of extrajudicial killings. Having
visited all three of the countries
listed above (through work) I
would disagree with your ratings.
I expected better from Ethical
Consumer.
Imti Choonara
Ed: A longer version of the original
Oppressive Regimes article is
now on our website, with a
more detailed discussion of the
methodology and limitations of
research, including the issue of bias
in the US State Department reports
and Freedom House. Unfortunately,
the US country reports are the only
source of data on human rights in
the world that are both global in
scope and systematic in what is
reported. We welcome suggestions
of alternative sources to Freedom
House and other ways to improve
the research.
Not so ethical: Nature
Babycare nappies
On page 7 (EC130) you refer to
Nature Babycare nappies as being
ethical. In fact these nappies are
made in Israel - it is written in
very small writing on the packet.
So as far as I’m concerned they
are not very ethical. Please could
you point this out in the next
magazine?
Michael Eccles
Ed: Thanks indeed for pointing
this out Michael. The fact that
they manufacture in Israel has
now been added to our database,
which should prevent the situation
happening again.
Subscription price confusion
In your May/June editorial you said
that the new website edition was
free to direct debit subscribers.
As a direct debit subscriber (and a
subscriber since 1990 or 1991) I
was surprised, having opted to take
up the website offer, to receive a
letter saying my direct debit was
increasing from £21.50 to £29.95.
How is that free?
The confusion caused may be
unintentional, but it looks like the
web edition is costing me £8.45!
George Penaluna
Ed: Many apologies for poor
communication. The word ‘initially’
before ‘free’ would have been
much clearer.
Make buying ethically easier
What I’d find really useful is if you
were to talk to say, Ocado, about
them providing an API such that
you could provide a portal overlay
that filtered on ethical criteria.
Users visiting your portal would
only see Ocado products from
producers who met rigid ethical
standards. I’m not sure if Ocado
would go for it but something like
this has to be the future - I’d really
like to shop in a more ethically
aware way but I’m so busy.
Reader’s Tips
I have been an on/off reader of this
fine magazine for a few years now
and find it full of useful tips and
advice on how to live a greener,
less wasteful life. Two tips I would
like to pass on to readers:
a) Go back to using a fountain pen,
rather than a biro or gel pen which
leaves you with an un-recycleable
plastic tube. There must be
thousands in landfill by now. My
Parker duofold has its own internal
sack which sucks ink out of a
bottle. Ink cartridges can be refilled
from a bottle using a syringe.
b) My second suggestion is that
everyone opens out an envelope
flat, and makes a card template.
You can use the template to make
envelopes out of waste paper,
magazine pages, or other paper
which would be thrown away
otherwise. I make all my own
envelopes now, it’s quite fun.
Is it me or are envelopes getting
bigger and bigger? Surely this is
a move in the wrong direction?!
Redress the balance by using small
envelopes.
Miss P Hodges
We welcome readers’ letters. Letters may be
edited for reasons of space or clarity. If you
do not want letters to be published, please
mark them ‘Not for publication’. Our address
is on the contents page, or email us at letters@
ethicalconsumer.org
Jaspreet
Cantankerous Frank
by Marc Roberts / climatecartoons.org.uk
43
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03/12/2010 13:46:54
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issue132
45
Inside View
Sweat-free clothing?
©War On Want
Have sweatshop
campaigns made any
difference to the lives
of garment workers
or will they always
pay the price for fast
fashion? Simon Birch
asks the campaigners.
W
hat’s your patience like? I
don’t know about you but I’m
starting to lose mine with the
High Street’s mega-clothing brands and
retailers. It’s been over 15 years since the
first anti-sweatshop campaigners barged
centre-stage onto our TVs and newspapers
with their shock-horror stories of garment
workers being exploited in South East Asia
and China.
Sure – we’ve seen that some individual
campaigns have scored big wins such
as those against Uzbek cotton and
sandblasted jeans, but what’s been the
wider impact of all this campaigning and
media coverage? Can we expect there ever
to be a time when all garment workers are
treated with respect and sweatshops are
finally dumped?
“Probably the biggest positive change
that we’ve seen over the past decade is that
people are now talking about sweatshops
in a way that that just wasn’t happening
back then,” says Mick Duncan from
the campaign group No Sweat. “People
now have a sense that workers overseas
are being ripped off thanks to the issue
regularly hitting the headlines. We still
have an awfully long way to go though.”
Julia Hawkins from the Ethical
Trading Initiative, the group made up of
campaigners, companies and trades unions
that was launched in 1998 agrees that
some progress has been made: “Probably
the greatest achievement is that retailers
have moved on from a state of denial
46
Anton Marcus (in the foreground) at a
meeting with garment workers. Despite
there being over 150,000 garment workers
in Sri Lanka less than 10 per cent belong
to a union because of anti-union attitudes.
to accepting their responsibility for the
workers who make their products. There
are pockets of real progress, but we’ve yet
to see widespread, sustainable change for
poor and vulnerable workers.”
John Hilary who heads up War On
Want which has been at the forefront of
the recent sweatshop campaigns takes a
more positive line. Hilary is encouraged
by the Tory-led coalition which has finally
introduced a draft Bill to regulate the
power of the UK’s big supermarkets and
sees this as a sign that the government
is prepared to intervene and legislate
in response to overwhelming public
pressure: “I believe that we’re going to see
a breakthrough in the campaign for justice
for garment workers. The future is not with
the clothing industry policing itself but in
regulation and accountability.”
Sam Maher from the campaign
group Labour Behind the Label however
doesn’t share Hilary’s sense of optimism:
“Unfortunately I think that I’ll still be in
a job in 10 years’ time,” admits Maher.
“We still need to understand how we
can regulate such a globalised industry
on a country by country basis. Plus until
workers in producer countries are free to
join unions and organise collectively then
the possibility for fundamental change is
impossible.”
Anton Marcus agrees with Maher. As
Joint Secretary of the Free Trade Zones
and General Services Employees Union in
Sri Lanka, Marcus believes that the key to
finally ending wretched sweatshop labour
is for garment workers to be given the
freedom to join unions and campaign for
better working conditions. “Our biggest
fight is with the supplier companies who
are strongly anti-union and with the
government which refuses to implement
its International Labour Organisation
commitments and allow our garment
workers to join unions,” says Marcus
speaking from Sri Lanka.
Anton then gave a message to UK
shoppers: “When you buy clothes made in
Sri Lanka, it’s vital to make sure that they
are made by workers who are free to join
unions, are treated fairly and who are paid
a living wage. Please keep up the pressure
on the big clothing companies.”
Consumers clearly have a vital role to
play in the campaign against sweatshops.
“Whilst regulation is an ideal, in practice
I believe that on a global level it’s years
away. Consumers on the other hand
can exercise their retail muscle and
harangue companies tomorrow,” believes
Rob Harrison from Ethical Consumer.
“It’s widely acknowledged that it’s been
consumer action which has helped drive
progress in areas such as workplace health
and safety. We continue to produce our
regular clothing buyers’ guides because we
attribute great importance to the role of
consumers in the wider campaign against
sweatshops.”
See page 24 for links to workers’ rights
campaign groups.
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13/07/2011 14:54

Clothes - Ethical Consumer

Transcription

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