Tesco update



A day or two ago I put on my blog an account of my 2007 campaign to get Tesco to improve the working conditions of its outsourced garment workers who make the fashion clothes it retails in its stores; it followed War on Want's "Fashion Victims" report in December 2996. Today the Guardian carries a report on Tesco's plans for its own-label online clothing store by Julia Finch (who was so helpful to me in 2007). This provides me with my cue to go back on the campaign trail, particularly since War on Want published an update on its Bangladeshi investigation in December 2008. I reproduce my letter to the Guardian:


30 January Page 6 Tesco plans own-label online clothing store‏


Dear Sir The news that Tesco plans its own label online clothing store to boost fashion sales is good news for its customers and, no doubt, its shareholders. My concern, however, is with its outsourced garment workers in the developing world. Following the "Fashion Victims" report of War on Want in December 2006, based on research in Bangladesh, and with the publicity generated by your publication of a letter from me, as a Tesco shareholder I was able to move a resolution at its 2007 AGM mandating the company to pay its workers a living wage. 20% of its shareholders either voted for the resolution or abstained. But despite this unprecedented demonstration of shareholder activism and the ensuing outcry, the conditions of work of the garment workers have, if anything, deteriorated. An updated War on Want investigation in Bangladesh of the same factories visited two years earlier found that the basic monthly wage for a 48-hour week before overtime ranged from £13.97 to £24.37 and averaged £19.16 even though the cost of living has increased substantially, whilst a living wage is £44.82. What is more, the culture of fast fashion changes and aggressive buying practices of UK retailers put extreme pressure on suppliers and hence workers to produce more garments in less time; not surprisingly War on Want found that Bangladeshi workers work up to 80 hours a week and most worked 10 to 14 hours a day 6 days a week, well in excess of the official standard working week. In the global downturn, UK retailers who maintain employment in the developing world are to be congratulated. But not if the price paid means such gross exploitation of their workers. I challenge Tesco to abide by its Ethical Trading Initiative obligations to pay its outsourced employees a living wage.