Investigation reveals harsh conditions at Boohoo factory
Matthew Pinto-Chilcott, Owner, of Consensus HR comments: Investigation reveals harsh conditions at Boohoo factory – “An interesting article in ‘The Times’ in relation to working conditions at a UK company where the team call themselves “Slaves”! How can any company employ a team where they make comments such as this and in extremely poor conditions. A reputation of a company is vital for its success and employees making extremely poor comments about it, does not help. In this article, they comment about temperatures reaching 32 degrees which I could understand in the height of summer but in November! There is no legal limit on how high a temperature can get in a workplace but surely if you had an environment like this, you would aim to get some sort of air-conditioning in so that the team felt comfortable when working and producing more!
This investigation gives perfect examples of how not to look after your team and how to go against everything a good HR strategy would provide. The current economic climate may not give companies surplus funds to provide excessive HR benefits, but all of these listed within this article are conditions that do not cost a fortune and are purely down to mismanagement by the team and failure to work to best practice and Health & Safety regulations. I dread to think what their sickness / absence and retention must be and the continual additional costs of recruiting more employees both financially and in view of their reputation!”
NEWS ARTICLE – Investigation reveals harsh conditions at Boohoo factory :
An undercover investigation by The Times has revealed the harsh conditions at Boohoo’s warehouse in Burnley, where workers label themselves “slaves” and have complained of racism, sexual harassment, gruelling targets, inadequate training and ill-fitting safety equipment. The investigation found the conditions, where workers are forced to walk the equivalent of a half-marathon per shift in a sweltering warehouse in which night-time temperatures can reach 32C, have led to workers collapsing in the aisles. An undercover reporter revealed staff complained they are treated as “fodder,” with managers timing their lavatory breaks and no allowances made for injuries they said they had suffered as a result of the manual work. Justin Madders, Labour’s shadow minister for employment rights and protections, said: “These shocking revelations must be a wake-up call for ministers. The government has repeatedly failed to deliver their promised Employment Bill to tackle conditions in warehouses run like Victorian workhouses.” He said there needed to be “urgent guidance for safe indoor working temperatures.”
