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Let's be friendsNot content with just redressing the highstreet, People & Planet have launched our Redress Education campaign to end sweat labour on our own campuses. Many organisations in the UK exploit workers in their day to day practices — unfortunately universities, schools and colleges are no exception. Is your uni clothing made with Fairtrade cotton? What conditions are the factory workers who produce your sports team hoodies working under? And how much are your cleaning staff on campus paid? These are the kinds of questions we ask with the Redress Education campaign which demands an end to the sweat labour on our own campuses.
Redress Education is based on the inspiring United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS) program in the US. American students demanded that merchandise bearing their institutions logos be manufactured under fair and ethical conditions and raised awareness of sweatshop labour in their universities, colleges and schools. Their campaign has exerted continuous pressure on administrations and corporations, resulting in significant and concrete victories supporting the mainly young women who are fighting for fair working conditions around the world.
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Redress Education is demanding that:
University, college and school merchandise is produced under sweat-free conditions at all stages of the supply chain.
All staff are paid a minimum of a living wage.
Education institutions work together to form a sweat-free buying consortium.
Why do we need to Redress Education?
Though universities, colleges and schools have adopted Fairtrade policies, the reality is that universities are far from being truly fair-trade institutions: merchandise is still made under sweatshop conditions in factories around the world and university workers are paid poverty wages. Redress Education believes this is unacceptable in UK educational institutions.
Sweatshop conditions: Workers making university, college and school merchandise face abusive treatment, excessive working hours, dangerous conditions, and wages that are inadequate to meet basic needs.
Illegal repression: When workers organise and demand improvements, they are subject to threats, harassment, illegal firings, and the closure of their factories.
The race to the bottom: As multinational brands scan the globe for the cheapest products, supplier factories face tremendous pressure to keep costs to a bare minimum. In this reality, workers and their unions have little hope of winning the wages and conditions they need.
Poverty wages: It is not just workers in the global south that are being forced to live on poverty wages. Here in the UK workers at universities colleges and schools are paid the minimum wage, which when applied to many parts of the country amounts to poverty pay.
The Solution!
Ensuring our education doesn’t rely on sweat-labour is difficult — but there are three vital elements that have proved crucial in ending the exploitation of workers:
A voice on the job
The best way to eliminate sweatshops is for workers to have the power to defend their interests on a daily basis through the collective voice of a union. University, college, school products must be made in factories where workers have this voice to eliminate sweatshop abuses.
A living wage
From seed to shop all workers must be paid a living wage — an amount of money which means people can meet their basic needs. In order for workers to earn the income they need, brands must pay factories prices high enough to enable living wages and educational institutions must ensure the minimum wage is high enough to cover basic needs.
A race to the top
Currently, most university, college and school apparel is produced in the same factories that produce for big box retailers like Wal-Mart, and under the sweatshop conditions that multinationals have established as norms for the industry. We must create an alternative model — a race to the top — in which university merchandise is produced in factories that demonstrate respect for worker rights (not just low prices) and in which worker victories are sustained and protected.
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