Disney wins ‘Sweatshop Retailer of the Year’

Statement of Maquila Solidarity Network

June 18— Disney has nosed out Wal-Mart in this year’s race for the “Sweatshop Retailer of the Year” award. According to Bob Jeffcott of the Toronto-based Maquila Soldarity Network (MSN), which co-sponsored the awards with Oxfam Canada, close to 3,000 concerned citizens in Canada and other countries voted online, selecting Disney from among four retailers most associated with sweatshop abuses over the past year. Nike finished third in the vote, and Reitmans came in dead last.

The winners of the Sweatshop Retailer Awards, “the Sweaties,” were announced on June 18 at a mock awards ceremony held outside the Metro Toronto Convention Center, the site of the Retail Council of Canada (RCC)’s annual conference, where the RCC’s “Excellence in Retailing Awards” were presented that same evening.

Wal-Mart, last year’s Sweatshop Retailer of the Year, received this year’s “Smokescreen Award” for the company hiding the most from its customers. Ironically, Wal-Mart is also in the running for the Retail Council’s award for “Socially Responsible Retailer” of the year. On a more positive note, the MSN and Oxfam announced that Liz Claiborne had received the “Transparency Award” for the company that is learning that honesty is the best policy.

Disney: Sweatshop Retailer of the Year

According to Jeffcott, Disney’s selection as “Sweatshop Retailer of the Year” can be attributed to a report by the Hong Kong Christian Industrial Committee (CIC) documenting sweatshop abuses in 12 Disney supply factories in China. The report charges that young, women, migrant workers making Disney clothes, toys, and accessories were forced to work up to 16 hours a day, six to seven days a week for wages as low as $45 a month. The report also criticizes Disney’s code monitoring program, claiming that most workers do not understand the purpose of the code, and that some workers were drilled on how to answer Disney monitors’ questions “correctly.”

Wal-Mart: Sweatshop Smokescreen Award

Wal-Mart was singled out for the “Smokescreen Award” for allegedly misleading customers about its association with a Chinese factory producing “Kathie Lee” handbags. Workers were reportedly locked in the plant for all but 60 minutes a day, forced to work up to 90 hours a week, punched and hit for talking back to managers, and charged large portions of their salaries for food and lodging.

Liz Claiborne: Sweatshop Transparency Award

Liz Claiborne received the MSN’s and Oxfam’s “Transparency Award” for agreeing to make public a highly critical report on factory conditions by the Guatemalan independent monitoring group, COVERCO. “While Liz Claiborne is far from sweat-free,” says Jeffcott, “accepting independent monitoring and disclosing critical reports are important steps in the right direction.”

Mountain Equipment Coop: Honorary Picket Fence Award

Mountain Equipment Coop (MEC) received the “Honorary Picket Fence Award” for being the company that can’t tell which side it’s on. The company prides itself on its ethical practices, but MEC has a long way to go before it can assure its members that MEC products are made under humane working conditions.

Transparency is the theme of this year’s Sweatshop Retailer Awards, co-sponsored by the MSN, Oxfam Canada, the Canadian Labour Congress, Students Against Sweatshops-Canada, and the Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees. The No Sweat campaign is calling on public institutions to adopt ethical purchasing policies and require that their apparel suppliers publicly disclose where the products are made. The campaign is also demanding changes in federal regulations to require retailers to publicly disclose production locations for all apparel products sold in Canada.

For more information: Maquila Solidarity Network: www.maquilasolidarity.org

British unions oppose US ‘Star Wars’ plans

By Patrick Wintour and Ian Black

June 14— Tony Blair is for the first time facing serious union and party pressure to oppose George Bush’s proposals for a nuclear missile defense shield.

Unions and Labour MPs are preparing to demand that the Labour party conference backs a resolution opposing any cooperation with the US plans.

In the first sign of the mounting scale of opposition, 18 union general secretaries have written to the Guardian today warning that Bush’s scheme for an anti-ballistic missile system will do “immense damage to international treaties covering weapons of mass destruction.”

They add that if the US sets aside treaties when it feels it is expedient to do so, “international confidence in treaties as a system of resolving problems will be considerably undermined.” They conclude that it would be “wholly inappropriate for our government to support this initiative and strongly urge it not to do so.”

The letter is timed to cause maximum impact as, at the NATO summit in Brussels yesterday, Blair adopted the role of the EU leader most supportive in public of the US president’s plans.

The prime minister praised an “articulate” Bush for consulting European allies over the so-called Son of Star Wars missile defense scheme and insisted Britain shared US concerns about “unstable states.” Blair made clear yesterday he wanted to avoid any confrontation with Washington over the issue, as did other EU leaders.

“We understand entirely, and indeed share, the American concerns,” he said. “There are highly unstable states who are developing nuclear capability. We have got to look at all the different ways, including defense systems, that we can deal with that threat.”

Any party conference defeat for Mr Blair on the issue would be a severe embarrassment for the party leadership, and revive memories of some of the battles in the 1980s over the stationing of US cruise missiles.

In private, British government officials believe Bush is going to press ahead with deployment of the missile shield anyway, so there is little point mounting a futile campaign of public opposition.

The leaders of most of the big Labour party-affiliated unions have signed the letter to the Guardian, including the general secretaries of the Transport and General Workers Union, Unison, and the GMB.

The leaders of two other unions -- USDAW and MSF -- who have not signed are likely to fall into line since their annual conferences have both passed resolutions opposing national missile defense.

The powerful Amalgamated Engineering and Electrical Union, the linchpin of Blairism in the Labour movement, is not likely to oppose Blair on the issue.

A union source said it was unlikely that the opposition to the missile shield would be voiced at the TUC, but plans were under way for a critical motion at the Labour conference.

Before the election 181 MPs, the vast bulk of them Labour backbenchers, signed an early day motion opposing the Bush plan. Malcolm Savidge, its sponsor, said he was planning to retable the motion and was hoping to get wider support in the new parliament.

The Foreign Office said yesterday that Ben Bradshaw, the newly appointed junior foreign office minister, would take responsibility for disarmament and security issues.

In Brussels, Blair sidestepped questions about his views on the 1972 anti-ballistic missile treaty, the Cold War-era arms control pact which Bush is determined to scrap.

“I think the most important thing that came across very strongly, even from those who have reservations about missile defense, is that Europe and America should always stick together,” Blair said.

“Of course there will be areas where we need intensive consultation and negotiation on issues like missile defense, but the world is a more stable and secure place if Europe and America are together.”

Blair said he did not recognize the “caricature” of Bush as an unintelligent unilateralist who did not care for what Europeans thought.

Source: The Guardian