Clonmany man slates 'slave' factories 13.08.07

A CLONMANY man who fights for the rights of 'slave' textiles workers has hit out at the conditions endured by Asian workers making clothes for the Kate Moss range at Topshop.

Neil Kearney, the general secretary of the International Textile, Garment and Leather Workers Federation (ITGLWF), was commenting as part of a major exposé on the labour used to supply billionaire Sir Philip Green's massive retail empire including Topshop, Arcadia, Burton and Dorothy Perkins. The 'Sunday Times' investigation revealed that such factories employ hundreds of Sri Lankan, Indian and Bangladeshi workers in Mauritius where they labour

for up to 12 hours a day, six days a week, for as little as €6 a day. Workers told reporters they were recruited in their home countries by self-employed agents who promised wages up to five times what they receive. They pay up to £725 to get the job, equivalent to seven months’ earnings but once in Mauritius "they receive as little as 22p to 40p an hour, about 40% below the local average wage". Mr. Kearney said the the low wages and long hours amounted to “slave labour”. “Because of the economic conditions of a country like Mauritius, companies are unable to attract local labour," he told the paper. "Instead they recruit migrant workers, who pay a significant fee for the job. Many migrant workers who go to work in these garment factories are like slaves.” Fifty-seven year old Kearney, who is married with two children and based in Brussels, emigrated to Britain at the age of 17 in search of work. He took a position with the National Westminster Bank and joined the National Union of Bank Employees on his first day. In 1972, he took a job with the National Union of Tailors and Garment Workers and the following year was appointed information officer. Four years later, he became head of the information and research department. He has served as an adviser to the British Economic Development Committee for the Clothing Industry and was a member of the TUC's Textile, Clothing and Footwear Industries' committee from 1976 to 1988. He was a Labour Party candidate for the British Parliament in the February and October 1974 general elections and was elected councillor in the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea in London in 1978. As ITGLWF chief, he has visited more than 140 different countries worldwide and has seen the ITGLWF membership grow from 5.3 million to 9 million workers in 130 countries worldwide.

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