Workers are being paid 5p an hour and working 80-hour weeks to produce cheap fashion for the retailers, the War on Want charity alleged today.
In a report released today entitled Fashion Victims: The True Cost of Cheap Clothes at Primark, Asda and Tesco, the charity criticised the three retailers. The charity's chief executive Louise Richards called on the Government to bring in effective regulation to end what she called 'shameful practices'.
However, all three retailers have strongly denied the claims. Asda criticised the charity for failing to identify which factories it visited.
The report was based on research carried out among 60 employees working at six factories in Bangladesh's capital, Dhaka. The factories employ over 5,000 workers, mainly women, and, according to the report, make clothes for the three bargain retailers.
The report claimed that, despite the retailers' commitments to paying living wages to suppliers, wages in these factories began as low as£8 a month. This is less than a third of the£22 the charity cited as the minimum living wage in Bangladesh.
The charity also claimed that some workers were regularly working 80-hour weeks, and had been intimidated by bosses into lying about working conditions when the retail companies conducted social audits to assess the treatment of suppliers' workers.
Richards said: 'Bargain retailers such as Primark, Asda and Tesco are only able to sell at rock-bottom prices in the UK because women workers in Bangladesh are being exploited. The companies are not even living up to their own commitments towards their overseas suppliers.'
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