State labor pressure helps Honduran workers

April 17, 2009  The Daily Gazette (Schenectady, NY)

By Kathleen Moore, Gazette Reporter

       The Honduran workers who make most of Schenectady's firefighter uniforms are finally being paid minimum wage, after a year of pressure from the state and a national textile union.

       Workers at the Alamode Plant in Honduras also received back pay for all the years in which they were illegally paid less than the Honduran minimum wage. And, for the first time, their company obeyed Honduras law and enrolled them in the country's social security system, which provides access to health care, injury leave and other benefits.

       The success was announced Wednesday by Sweatfree Communities, which revealed the conditions in Honduras and other overseas factories last year. Lion Apparel, which uses the Alamode Plant and holds the Schenectady contract for most firefighter apparel, was the only company that took action in response to the report.

       Sweatfree Communities commended Lion for its efforts, but said the company must do more.

       Women who sew the firefighters' uniforms are still summarily fired if they become pregnant, and managers force them to take pregnancy tests every year, according to Sweatfree Communities.

       The group's report also said that most overseas textile employees -- with the exception of those at Alamode -- still face unsafe and degrading working conditions.

       Schenectady's firefighter jackets -- not the fire-resistant gear, but the ones worn with the station uniform -- are still made in sweatshops, Sweatfree Communities said.

       Fechheimer, which holds the city contract for those jackets, has them made at Hui Yang Charming Garments, a factory in China. In the Sweatfree Communities' report on that factory, workers told interviewers that anyone who complained about labor violations was fired on the spot. They said they were also told to lie whenever Fechheimer sent monitors to observe the conditions at the plants. If they didn't lie, they said, they would be fired.

       They said they are also paid 20 percent less than the Chinese minimum wage, never receive overtime even though they are required to work as many as 18 hours a day during peak season, and that 20 children under the age of 16 work there, all violations of Chinese law.

       Of all the textile companies named in the first report a year ago, only Fechheimer has not yet responded, Sweatfree Communities Executive Director Bjorn Claeson said. Most other companies responded by denying the allegations.

       Fechheimer Senior Vice President Fred Heldman did not return messages seeking comment on the report's allegations, but a year ago he told The Daily Gazette that his company isn't responsible for working conditions at overseas plants. The operators who run the plants do follow the labor laws that are enforced in their country, he said.

       Lion Apparel had a far different response to the report. When Sweatfree Communities released last year's report, company leaders said their monitors never observed any violations.

       But General Manager Stephen Schwartz took the unprecedented step of writing directly to every Alamode employee and asking for confidential complaints so the company could correct all violations of workers' rights.

       In a translation of the letter, provided by Sweatfree Communities, Schwartz wrote that he "takes any charge of grave violations very seriously."

       He repeatedly urged workers to "help prove the truthfulness of these charges" so that he could correct the problems.

       When Sweatfree Communities investigated, they found that all major issues except the pregnancy rule had been resolved.

       Their report on continuing violations at other plants got Gov. David Paterson's attention.

       In response to the follow-up report, the state sent a letter Wednesday to each of the named textile companies, warning them to correct any human rights violations at their plants. "The state of New York has a long-standing commitment to protecting the rights of workers who produce the apparel and other products that we purchase," wrote John Egan, commissioner of the state Office of General Services.

       He warned that the state is developing more effective sweat-free purchasing policies and told the companies to "respond constructively" to the report.

       Claeson said American textile companies are reluctant to face those problems head-on because the only solution is to pay the workers more.

       "The brand pays rock-bottom prices. What the companies need to start doing is negotiate fairer prices with the factory," Claeson said.

       He argued that higher worker salaries would result in only "slightly higher" retail prices.

       "Workers' wages amount to 1 to 3 percent on a piece of apparel," he said. "The solution is so near, and yet so far away."