For the attention of the Editor

Background notes to follow the summary of activities

Anti-sweatshop protests at the Manchester Commonwealth Games, summary:

Protest meeting
7.30 Wednesday 31 July
Friends Meeting House, Mount Street

Demonstration and rally
Assemble at 11.30, Saturday 3 August
All Saints Park, Oxford Road

Benefit night for Dita Sari and the FNPBI (Indonesian trade unionists)
8.00pm-2.00am, Saturday 3 August
Manchester Met Students Union, Oxford Road

More details:
manchester@nosweat.org.uk
07951 741 640

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BRIEFING PAPER ON COMMONWEALTH GAMES
WHY WE ARE CAMPAIGNING AT THE COMMONWEALTH GAMES

Sport has become big business and events such as  the Commonwealth Games provide an opportunity for companies  to gain publicity and push their products. Among those companies are those that - directly or indirectly -  employ sweatshop labour or abuse labour rights.
No Sweat has four particular areas of concern as far as the Commonwealth Games are concerned:
the sponsorship of the Games themselves;
the origin of official Commonwealth Games merchandise;
the failure of the Commonwealth Games authorities to take action to force the implementation of internationally recognised labour standards by their suppliers;
the use of the Games as an opportunity for the advertising and marketing of goods produced in sweatshops.
In this paper we provide examples of each of these aspects of the Games.

COMMONWEALTH GAMES SPONSORS

ASDA 
On completion of the training programme all  Commonwealth Games volunteers are guaranteed an interview with one of the event’s sponsors, Asda Walmart. 
At Asda Walmart’s new store near the Commonwealth Games stadium,  trade unions are not allowed to meet employees until they have been in place for six months, undermining any potential for collective labour organising in that period.  The store argues that it has its own version of trade unions, including its Law Club, which will recruit legal representation for disgruntled employees. 
This though leaves the resources, and the power, with the employer - and Walmart is not just any employer when it comes to controlling its employees. In 2000 Walmart in the US was forced to pay $50 million to settle charges that 69,000 workers were forced to work unpaid overtime. The firm encourages loyalty by practices that were compared by one ex-employee to 'brainwashing' and another to being 'like a cult'. (The Times, 16/7/2002) Walmart is currently facing trial in the US for using "intimidation, threats, retaliation, coercion and surveillance" aimed at the US union UFCW. The National Labour Relations Board found them guilty of illegal union busting of UFCW Local 880. 
A need for an independent body to deal with employee grievances at the new Manchester Asda has already come up:  Asda Walmart’s night cleaners are being paid approximately half the rate of night cleaners at the stadium,  just across the road.  Dissatisfied employees have no independent channel through which they can raise concerns without fear of dismissal.  This creates insecurity, not hope for a better future.

MANCHESTER AIRPORT
Manchester Airport has been involved in a long dispute with security workers in the Transport and General Workers Union. The airport has imposed new contracts involving wage cuts of up to £14,000 and increased working hours. At the same time, the airport is providing £2 million in sponsorship for the Commonwealth Games.

The ultimate irony is that the Games have been trying to recruit exactly the same workers to overcome a shortage of skilled security workers at stadia and other venues during the Games. Posters appeared in airport staff rooms reading '"Wondering what to do with your days now the football season is over? Well read on." TGWU representative Andrew Dodgson said: "The prospect of working at the Games in these circumstances is underwhelming."

Security guards at the airport took two hour strike action on July 21st and have further strikes planned for July 30th and August 3rd.

MICROSOFT 
Microsoft use "permatemps" for the bulk of their workforce. Kept on temporary contracts for years, they are denied the pay and benefits given to the inner circle with real contracts. In December 2000 they were forced to pay out $97m in lawsuits to permatemps. They now contract people for a short time, lay them off and hire them again to avoid paying them properly. They have also used prison labour to pack their products. 

COMMONWEALTH GAMES MERCHANDISE
Where and by whom is official Commonwealth Games merchandise produced? It is very difficult to find out. Few items contain any clear indication of who the manufacturer is or the country of origin. Even the official sales organisation 'Official Merchandise' whose name appears on many labels does not know. In a recent email a representative wrote: ' We are merely in charge of the marketing / merchandising side of things.' Any queries had to be referred on to suppliers. Most labels give the names of companies in the UK that act as importers or middlemen.

Some of the items that do specify where or by whom they are produced give cause for concern.

CORGI TOYS
A number of metal toys (bus, taxi, lorry) bearing Commonwealth Games decoration are made by Corgi Toys in China. Corgi's parent company, Zindart, are frank about why they have chosen this part of the world for their manufacturing:
"The Company's manufacturing operations are strategically located approximately 60 miles from Hong Kong. The PRC ['People's Republic of China] provides the Company with access to a large pool of engineers and technically trained craftsmen, as well as an inexpensive labor force." 
(HYPERLINK http://www.zindart.com/highligh.htm
www.zindart.com/highligh.htm)

Zindart also talks of the 'approximately 643,000 square feet of dormitory space' it provides for over 10,000 workers at its plants, which works out at less than 8' by 8' for each person to live in.

China is notorious for its failure to allow independent trade unions, for ignoring its own labour laws and for the conditions in which the millions of workers have come from the countryside to the new  industrial zones live and work. (See  HYPERLINK http://www.chinalaborwatch.org www.chinalaborwatch.org ) The BBC programme 'Crossing Continents' broadcast on July 18th revealed the working conditions in the metal manufacturing industries in the areas close to Hong Kong. One worker, Shao Hung Xin, whose hand was flattened by an 80-ton metal press, blamed the accident on tiredness after working every day for five months and said that exhausted workers toil on old machines, with little training. Despite Communist Party claims that  cases of abuse are rare and that factory owners who violate the law are prosecuted, the programme's makers found every worker they talked to had been either overworked or underpaid, or both.
 
FRUIT OF THE LOOM
Commonwealth Games sweatshirts bear a label indicating that, though they are licensed through a firm called Elms Marketing based in Macclesfield, they are manufactured by the large US textile manufacturing company Fruit of the Loom. 
Like Zindart, Fruit of the Loom boasts of its "low cost production resulting primarily from the offshore location of substantially all of its labor-intensive manufacturing operations… As part of this strategy, over the last three years the Company transferred substantially all of its sewing operations to locations in Mexico, the Caribbean and Central America." 

(HYPERLINK http://www.fruit.com/static/company/index.cfm http://www.fruit.com/static/company/index.cfm) 

As a result of this and the use of Fruit of the Loom to manufacture college T-shirts, the firm has been a major target for the US anti-sweatshop movement. Details of  working conditions in a Free Trade Zone in El Salvador used by Fruit of the Loom can be found at www.nclnet.org/elsalvador/ ckappletree.html . 

In 2001, the International Textile, Garment and Leather Workers' Union  condemned Fruit of the Loom for "disgraceful behaviour in three continents" after the company engaged in union-busting activities at its plant in Morocco. It had transferred production to Morocco from Ireland on the grounds of 'high production costs' in Ireland at a cost of 800 jobs. ITGLWF General Secretary Neil Kearney said: 

"The company's Moroccan workforce simply held a General Assembly at the headquarters of the Union Marocaine du Travail (UMT), and decided to create a branch union. Within a week of hearing of the meeting, the company embarked upon a union-busting campaign and a militia was employed to intimidate those workers who had attended. Two days later, having discovered the names of the union leaders and even before any demands had been made, management announced their dismissal. General Manager Abdelmalek El Ouassini was adamant in his refusal to allow a union in the factory. 'There is no freedom of association here!', he said. He then hung a huge banner on the front wall of the factory which read 'no to the union'. Since then, there has been an atmosphere of fear inside the factory."  The sacked union organisers were subsequently harassed by the police and militia

COMMONWEALTH GAMES AUTHORITIES' FAILURE TO IMPLEMENT LABOUR STANDARDS

The Commonwealth Games authorities have failed to provide a framework within which the outlawing of the use of sweatshop labour by suppliers and sponsors is clear or effective. In a letter to No Sweat dated 14/6/02, Chief Executive, Frances Done merely refers to the Sustainability Strategy and the Code of Ethics and specifies that "M2002 Ltd expects its partners to abide by all relevant national and local laws and regulations and this expectation would cover  those relating to working conditions".
The use of the word "expects" indicates clearly the absence of any mechanism by which M2002 Ltd intends to enforce these codes. While guidelines for purchasing require "information about environmental considerations in contract documentation", there  is no indication that the information is of any significance in coming to a decision. Nor is there any equivalent requirement about labour rights or working conditions anywhere in the documentation. Further, the term 'partners' only refers to those with a direct relationship to the Games rather than those at earlier stages of the supply chain.
In contrast to the Sydney Olympics where a thorough, if poorly implemented, Code of Conduct was adopted, much of the Sustainability Strategy is either of local relevance or consists of pious statements such as:
"As a commercial organisation, the key objective is to ensure the viability and success of the XVII Games. However, M2002's corporate behaviour will reflect the importance which it attaches to social justice, environmental responsibility and equity of access to economic opportunity and the quality of life.'
Can the Games organisers really claim that they have done everything they can to ensure the Commonwealth Games further 'social justice'? The evidence seems to be that their commercial goals have overridden these other aims. 

THE COMMONWEALTH GAMES AS MARKETING OPPORTUNITY

The Commonwealth Games will be used by many corporations without an official connection as a means to boost sales through advertising and sponsorship. The logos of firms like Nike, Adidas and Reebok will be seen by millions on television on atheltes' shirts and shoes.  Yet the sweatshops behind the sportswear will remain hidden.
The UK Athletics  team is sponsored by Reebok. Conditions in Reebok's Chinese factories are graphically described by the worker correspondents of China Labor Watch: illegal long hours, failure  to pay the minimum wage, lack of social benefits, crowded living conditions in the dormitories, short term contracts, tough psychological pressure and constant violation of both Chinese law and Reebok's own cosmetic Human Rights standards.
Indonesian trade unionist Dita Sari was the recipient of a $55,000 Human Rights Award from Reebok. She and her union, the FNPBI, decided to refuse it. 

This is why: 

"I have taken this award into a very deep consideration. We finally decided not to accept this. On the one hand, this is a kind of recognition of the struggle and the hard work that we have done for years. But on the other hand, we are very conscious of the condition of the Reebok workers from the third world countries, such as in Indonesia, Mexico, China, Thailand, Brazil and Vietnam. As a trade union, we strongly put a lot of pressure to achieve what every worker deserves: higher wages, better working conditions and a brighter future for their children.

"In Indonesia, there are five Reebok companies. 80% of the workers are women. All companies are sub-contracted, often by the South Korean companies such as Dung Jo and Tong Yang. Since the workers can only get around $1.5 a day, they then have to live in a slum area, surrounded by poor and unhealthy conditions, especially for their children. At the same time, Reebok collected millions of dollars of profit every year, directly contributed by these workers.

"The low pay and exploitation of the workers of Indonesia, Mexico and Vietnam are the main reasons why we will not accept this award. Some of our members in the union work in companies producing Reebok shoes."  

(Full text at 
HYPERLINK http://www.counterpunch.org/ditasari.html http://www.counterpunch.org/ditasari.html)

No Sweat is organising a campaign to replace Reebok's tainted money with funds given by trade unionists and other supporters across the world. We are holding a benefit at Manchester Metropolitan University Students' Union in Oxford Road, Manchester from 8pm on August 3rd  to support FNPBI's work.

WHAT IS NO SWEAT?
No Sweat is an activist, campaigning organisation, fighting sweatshops and supporting workers' rights world-wide.  From the small, backstreet sweatshop to some of the biggest corporations in the world,  child labour, forced overtime, poverty wages, unsafe conditions, harassment of women workers and intimidation of trade unionists are commonplace. 

We look to the anti-capitalist protest movements and to the international workers' movement. We seek to build common, united, campaigning action against exploitation and the sweatshop bosses.
No Sweat stands for workers' solidarity. We are for: 

A living wage 
Safe working conditions 
Independent trade unions. 

We aim to: 

Make solidarity with sweatshop workers and their organisations 
Help unionise sweatshops in Britain 
Publicise, expose and help stamp out sweatshop employment. 

To Contact No Sweat nationally: No Sweat, PO Box 36707. London SW9 8YA Phone: 07904 431 959 
admin@nosweat.org.uk
Website: 
http://www.nosweat.org.uk 

To contact No Sweat in Manchester: 
Phone: 07951 741640 
manchester@nosweat.org.uk 

Manchester No Sweat
C/o 1 Cundiff Road
Chorlton Cum Hardy
Manchester M21 8FS
manchester@nosweat.org.uk