Take a stand on fashion: defend workers' rights
Saturday, 20 May 2006 14:16
Labour Behind the Label has launched a new campaign tool for consumers to use when you shop. The tool is an action card that can be posted to any of the major high street fashion chains; it has a space to staple on the receipt from the next item of clothes you buy there, to show how much your custom is worth.
Working late into the night, seven days a week, for just a few pence an hour
This is life for tens of millions of people sewing the clothes we wear. They often work in cramped, dangerous conditions, in jobs that disappear when orders are low. Most garment workers are women; they cope with harassment and discrimination at work and then have another shift at home, cooking, cleaning, and caring for children. They are prevented from forming unions to help change conditions where they work. And these problems aren’t limited to a few companies or a few factories: they exist across the whole industry, round the world.
We can change all this
Life can be better for garment workers. Experience shows that fashion companies can improve working conditions if they take workers' rights seriously. What's stopping them? They don't believe it's worth the effort.
So let's take a stand
Send off the campaign postcards next time you go clothes shopping. Attach the recepit, tag or label to show that your custom is worth real money. Then post it off to the relevant address on the action card, or hand in in at the store.
