Labour Behind The Label

Responded to survey: yes

MSI involvement: no

Grade 2: Acknowledges that minimum and industry benchmark wages are not sufficient standards, but no real efforts to apply living wage. [what's this?]

Summary

Matalan seems to be having success with increasing pay through work study engineering and are citing good intentions around freedom of association programmes. However, its submission shows it has a limited understanding of complex issues and Matalan has a long way to go to convince us that its efforts are genuinely improving wages.

Position on living wages

‘Matalan continue to support the principle that workers should be paid a reasonable living wage.’

Living wage benchmarks

None given.

Position on freedom of association

As part of a project idea to increase wages through support for freedom of association in Bangladesh, Matalan ‘plan to reach agreements and put in place non discriminatory policies and procedures for workers to have the right to form or join a trade union of their choice without fear of intimidation or reprisal. We also want to provide worker representatives with the relevant facilities to assist in the development of effective collective bargaining.’

Work so far on living wages

Matalan has been carrying out efficiency projects in Bangladesh, Turkey and China.

‘Matalan have employed the services of work study engineers who have implemented time and motion practices, not only to set real time and motion standards but to demonstrate how being more effective in work can equally reward all parties.’

Results: ‘The majority of the pilot production workforces in each hub are earning 3 times their local government minimum salary.’

The details provided about this project do not, however, allow us determine if they are explicitly designed to address low wages or not.

Plans on living wages

Matalan plan to work with ‘non production workers’ in Bangladesh to support freedom of association as a route to a living wage. This project will be designed via a consultation process with representatives from the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA), local trade unions, Matalan’s technical services controller and country manager, and workers from 4 different product type factories. The details of what this project will involve are to be determined through this process.

Plans to work with homeworkers in India were also mentioned but no detail provided.

Other significant information

‘Over the last 18 months Matalan have employed 16 additional heads most of which are ex pats with a wealth of manufacturing and compliance experience to ensure Matalan’s social and corporate responsibilities are adhered to.’

Our comments

Matalan’s efficiency engineering seems to have been very successful. However, no mention is made of consultation with workers over the improvements in the factories, or how the increase in worker salary was verified. Matalan says that it rewards the supplier with a bonus as a result of efficient and on time delivery, and this in turn gets passed on to the workers. In our experience, this trickle-down effect is not automatic unless there is some way of verifying it. It is also unclear if the wages cited by Matalan are based on a normal working week, or the extent to which wages have actually increased to reach this level.

Matalan’s proposed work in Bangladesh to encourage freedom of association using a collaborative approach sounds interesting. Some involvement from the national and international union movement will be vital in ensuring freedom of association rights are improved.

No real mention was made of any work on purchasing practices. Progress in this area is vital for an inexpensive fast fashion brand such as Matalan and it would do well to address this as a priority.

Joining the ETI would help Matalan to increase its understanding of the issues and share learning with other brands who are further along in developing living wage programmes.

Something different has swept through the UK high street.  Whereas ten years ago, style-conscious teenagers would never be seen, like, dead in a bargain clothes shop, today the Saturday afternoon high street is awash with Primark bags and their proud owners boasting the bargains they have found. That anyone would admit to buying clothes from a supermarket would have been inconceivable until recent years, but ask someone at a party now where their nice new jeans are from, and they may well have been picked up that afternoon along with the baked beans and cornflakes in Asda.  This report aims to set out questions that the consumer can ask of the retailers that are becoming ever more a key part of the consumer horizon.