LAST week Sir Philip Green was relaxing on holiday in his usual way. The
billionaire was cruising on board his £30m 165ft yacht Lionheart, drinking
Cristal champagne and shouting into his mobile phone.
Callers inquiring whether the tycoon was concerned about problems within his
Arcadia retail empire were dealt with abruptly. “Foot and mouth – now that’s
what I’d call a crisis – and I haven’t got that,” Green told one journalist.
The lifestyle of Green, a man who celebrated his 50th birthday with a £5m toga
party in Cyprus and who two years ago hired Beyonce to sing at the £4m bar
mitzvah of his son, stands in contrast to the lives of workers at the front
line of his empire.
In an office in the Sri Lankan town of Dehiwala, one senior worker spoke out
over her treatment while working at a textile factory which makes clothes
for Green – and what happened when she and her fellow workers complained.
Amali, 32, is typical of the migrant workers who travel between continents in
search of work in the global textile trade. She received a leaflet from
recruiters who travel from town to town in Sri Lanka advertising vacancies
for garment factory workers in Mauritius.
The deal was simple – potential workers had to pay a fee of up to £725 to an
agent who would arrange air tickets and a three-year job. It looked
attractive as the money promised was far more than that offered for similar
work in Sri Lanka.
Many others are recruited in a similar way. They pay the agents, who advertise
in local newspapers, between £350 and £725 for a job offer and an air-line
ticket to Mauritius. Many mortgage their smallholdings to pay the agents’
fees.
However, workers claim that their wages are substantially less than promised.
According to a union official, one worker was told she would be paid about
£500 a month in Mauritius but received only £100.
When Amali arrived at the factory in Mauritius owned by a company called CMT
in May 2005, the reality – and the pay – were very different from what she
said had been promised.
“We were put in dormitories – approximately 20ft-30ft, 40-50 workers huddled
together in this room,” she claimed. “There was no space to move around. For
the 985 employees [in the factory] there were only 10 toilets and at least
three of them did not work at any time. More often there was no water in the
toilets. The food was so bad we could not consume it.”
Inside the factory, women sit in rows at sewing machines. One sews the hem
while others work on the arms, neck or sleeves. “There was no air
conditioning so on sunny days it was steaming hot and we sweated while
working. The temperatures were well over 32C,” said Amali, who took the job
to send money back to her mother and sisters in southwest Sri Lanka.
By January this year, Amali had been promoted to be a “matron” at the factory
in charge of the Sri Lankans. She decided to take a stand against the
conditions. With her fellow workers she complained about the living
conditions, the food, the lack of any leave or rest time and a working day
that could on some occasions last 17 hours, from 7am to midnight.
The workers claim that their wages were then stopped. They went on strike,
which the unions say is illegal in Mauritius. The response, they claim, was
deportation.
“They took us to the airport and left us there for three days. We could not
travel. We had no tickets. Armed gunmen, who we were told were from the
Mauritius armed forces, came and threatened us. We feared we would be shot
if we continued to protest. We were then kept in a camp,” Amali said.
“Thereafter 174 of us were given tickets and asked to leave Mauritius. We were
told that 300 others were detained in a jungle area in Sampiya and that they
lived inside freight containers.”
More than 300 Chinese workers had previously protested and gone on strike.
They had been tear-gassed by police. More than 100 were deported, according
to unions.
Last week a Sunday Times reporter travelled to Mauritius to interview workers
and their union representatives at factories operated by CMT and Star
Knitwear. Sitting outside a square concrete hostel at Star Knitwear, workers
eating chapati bread described the lines of bunk beds with only one toilet
for every 15 men.
One 50-year-old man had left behind his wife and daughter. “I have pain in my
back and in my neck because I am in the same position all day,” he said. “I
am annoyed and sad that I don’t get the money I was promised by the agent in
India. Some people have tried to speak out about the working conditions
here, but they have been sent back to India. I work from 7am until 8.30pm
and in the same position all day long.”
A 27-year-old from Bangalore said that he had had back surgery while working
at Star Knitwear where he has been for three years. “I wake up at 5am and
start work at 7am,” he said. “I have bad health. It is hard to wear the mask
they give me because of my health. The agent cheated me.”
CMT – Compagnie Mauricienne de Textile – operates several factories on the
island. One, visited last week, is a concrete block guarded by security men
and surrounded by 10ft-high steel fences, where women from the Indian
sub-continent work and sleep.
Although the workers are now given one day off a week following Sri Lankan
protests earlier this year, they are still unhappy about their treatment.
One Bangladeshi woman said: “I am tired at the end of the day. I miss my
family, especially my son. I have been working here for four months. When I
go to bed at the end of the day, I lay down and weep . . . They are getting
cheap labour.”
A copy of a contract from CMT shows that employees are obliged to work 70
hours a week and are not entitled to any holiday or paid sick leave for the
first year of their employment. They are awarded a bonus of a month’s salary
if they complete a year’s service and 50p an hour overtime for anything over
the 70-hour week. The contract also says that CMT has the right to withhold
a fifth of workers’ salaries which is paid only when the three-year
employment contract is completed.
Arcadia’s code of conduct for suppliers says workers should not be required to
work more than 48 hours a week on a regular basis. Last month the federation
of Mauritian trade unions made a formal complaint to the country’s prime
minister about the “conditions of service, conditions of living and [the]
salaries” of migrant textile workers in the country.
Fayzal Ally Beegun, a local union official, said: “Many workers are scared to
speak about conditions. They have seen other workers sent home after
complaining. However, workers have told me they work very long hours, they
are under lots of pressure and we believe that they are being exploited.”
Arcadia has not signed up to the ethical trading initiative, which sets out
minimum standards. Green said this weekend that Arcadia used internationally
recognised inspectors who regularly audited the factories but added that it
would investigate any potential breaches of its own code for the hours that
suppliers’ employees worked.
Firms such as Nike and Gap, which had previously been found to have poor
working conditions in suppliers’ factories, now have independent vetting
procedures and publish annual reports of their findings.
Yesterday Ahmed Parker, a director of Star Knitwear, said: “We respect all the
conditions [stipulated] by the government.”
He added: “We can’t use Mauritian workers, unfortunately. Mauritian workers
don’t want to work in the textile industry. The industry is more demanding
because when you sit on a machine all day, they find it more demanding than
working in a hotel as a waiter or doing rooms.
“Obviously there will be people that complain. There will be people that
find it difficult. We have had problems with agents in the past, like
everybody else.”
François Woo, managing director of CMT, said: “As far as the conditions of
work of our labour force are concerned, our company not only complies with
all the relevant conditions and requirements imposed by law but further
constantly improves them to ensure the standards are at all times higher
than those set.
“Our company is regularly subject to social compliance audits from independent
auditing companies. Our company has no reason to doubt the integrity of
government-licensed recruitment agents.”
Additional reporting: Iqbal Athas, Sri Lanka
£25 a week
Workers at textile factories in Mauritius, including CMT and Star Knitwear,
are typically paid about £100 a month. They say in order to earn this they
have to work 70 hours a week.
They may also receive free bed and board, which costs the firms about £2.80 a
week per worker. The highest-paid workers are those from Sri Lanka and
India, with Bangladeshis often paid less than £70 a month. Factory owners
claim this is because they have lower wages in their home country and have
fewer skills.
The average wage in Mauritius is £205 a month, according to the most recent
government statistics. Those working in hotels and restaurants are paid an
average £170 a month while those in large sugar cane plantations receive
about £150 monthly.
