Latest Information

Primark has again attracted the attention of the ethical trading community today after the company’s announcement that it is severing ties with 3 suppliers because of child labour found in their supply chains. Information on the labour standards of some suppliers, gained during the filming of the BBC’s Panorama series, was passed on to the company, who have since cancelled all orders from the suppliers in question and have removed the affected products from sale. The suppliers – all based in Southern India – appear to have subcontracted orders to smaller companies and home-working units where children were involved in applying embroidery and sequins to products. As a member of the Ethical Trading Initiative, Primark is committed to the principle that child labour shall not be used in production processes. Primark has taken a unilateral decision to stop sourcing from these suppliers, an approach which Impactt does not support (see our Child Labour Remediation Guidelines); the company has chosen to sever ties with its suppliers rather than working with them to tackle the root of the problem and assist the children involved in returning to education.

This latest news only adds to the pressure on the company’s ethical standards following recent unwanted attention after the cancellation of Alexa Chung’s sweatshop experiment in Covent Garden entitled ‘The Devil Wears Primark’. The programme was cancelled by Channel 4 at very short notice at the beginning of June, leaving many viewers disappointed that a seemingly promising exposé of the garment industry was instead replaced by Without a Paddle – a film about a camping trip.

The child labour issue and the focus of the television documentary coincide with the release of a Primark video on its specially created ethics website ‘Ethical Primark’, which aims to dispel some of the assumptions about the company’s purchasing practices and how it manages to keep its prices so low. Entitled ‘How Do They Do It’ the video talks about the company’s business model – claiming that low margins, no advertising expenditure and economies of scale, rather than compromising on product quality or working conditions, help to keep prices down.

With risk of sounding like a cliche i think we can all do our bit to change what we don’t like in the world. By not buying from really cheap shops who clearly must be expoiting someone to give us the prices we have now we can literally ‘vote with our purchases’ or non-purchases so more high street shops and companies take the issue of valuing the people that make what we wear and the environment more seriously.

Check out http://www.ethicaltradingcompany.com – set up to counteract so much of what was revealed in last night’s documentary.

It produces beautiful clothes and accessories at reasonable prices, is environmentally friendly and fair trade. It even gives a large percetage of profits back to the comunities that it works with; in advocacy, water and sanitation, eduactaion, healthcare programes..

There are other ways and other people out there making a difference so worth looking around…

Trudy, how exactly do you know that other companies are not exploiting people too? Higher prices generally just mean higher margins, not that more is being spent on the supply chain.

I fear that Primark is becoming the Tesco of the clothing world, an easy target because of lazy reporting that just focuses upon one player. Clearly Primark is not alone.

Furthermore, why do we always have to rely on the lowest common denominator? It’s miles travelled with food and now child labour for human rights. Child labour in itself isn’t wrong, the reality is this is the only way many families can earn enough money to feed and clothe themselves. More important is guaranteeing their safety , wages and quality of surroundings.

Thanks Andy and Trudy for your comments.The Ethical Trading Company looks like an interesting initiative. Its important that these communities can earn money without resorting to child labour.

The net result of the Panorama expose is that Primark pulled work from three factories; all those people lose work at short notice. Primark merely re-positions. Child labour is awful but better than starving. Do you really think that those children will now go to school?

it is terrible this is what they do to these children and then they lie saying that they do not use child labour its terrible

we think primark should not do child labour at all
love you xxxx

nicola i agree with you
love u 2 x