100 years since women’s suffrage, Manchester’s fast fashion brands are taking women’s equality to…
By: Gemma Gratton
Tags: Manchester, Manufacturing, Fast Fashion, Suffragette, Equality

100 years since women’s suffrage, Manchester’s fast fashion brands are taking women’s equality to a very dark place

Now is the time to ask more of our city’s largest fashion houses…

All around Manchester you see colourfully dressed women pictured revelling in the fashion of the moment — but these vibrant ads stand in stark contrast to fast fashion’s dangerously obscured garment supply chain. A new era of “dark factories” are coming to light as a result of the pandemic of 2020.

Manchester is fast becoming the global epicentre of fast fashion — home to mammoth brands such as Boohoo, Pretty Little Thing, In The Style and Missguided — their meteoric rise to fashion industry domination is the stuff of dreams.

But as reports flood in of factory safety compromised, wages left unpaid, and world protests as the garment workers hit breaking point, fast fashion’s biggest brands are facing a reckoning.

Recent allegations from campaign group, Labour Behind the Label, state that some garment factories in Leicester primarily supplying to Boohoo retained normal opening hours during the coronavirus crisis. It was also reported that sick workers were ordered to continue to report for duty. A damning undercover report from the Sunday Times, has resulted in prompt abandonment of the brand by other branded websites, tumbling share prices, and major stakeholder Standard Life Aberdeen releasing the majority of its shares.

Boohoo and other major fast fashion brands stand accused of failing to adequately monitor conditions at the factories, as experts and organisers within the local community express their belief that the notorious garment manufacturing sector was likely a hotbed of infection contributing to the resurgence of Covid-19 in the city.

(In response to the allegations Boohoo have begun an inquiry led by Alison Levitt QC, and stated that early investigations had not found evidence of suppliers paying workers £3.50 an hour, and that some of the claims made appeared to be inaccurate or misleading. Outside authorities have said that no evidence of slavery offences has been found, however Boohoo have fired two suppliers for non-compliance with its code of conduct.)

But why did it take a pandemic to convince authorities and investors to take action, when all along other retailers and consumers have been asking how it’s possible to pay the supply chain a living wage from a dress that costs £10 or less?

The secrets of fast fashion

In many ways, fast fashion is a victim of its own success: clothing ranges can be launched in rapid succession, with high profit margins enabled by “just in time” supply chains, wide-scale environmental neglect, and perhaps most nefariously of all, endemic gender inequality.

But surely things are improving, right? Wrong. Just last year, a deep dive into the wages paid to garment workers across the globe revealed that while some brands are making progress in promoting better practices, none of the fast fashion brands investigated were able to show that a living wage was being paid to any worker in supply chains outside their own headquarter countries, and no brand had yet entered into a legally binding agreement with suppliers which would ensure increased wages for their employees.

The intersection between gender inequality, environmental destruction and now Covid-19 is explored brilliantly on ruthmacgilp.com in a blog by Emily Kemp, who observes that garment workers, 80% of whom are women, “were paid poverty-level wages long before the pandemic began”, adding “due to the virus, they [the factories] are only driving already-impoverished women into further destitution”.

There is also evidence of six-day work weeks, abuse, child labour and suppression of unionisation prevalent across the garment trade.

Manchester Fashion Movement believes that Manchester is being seen to support and profit from the perpetuation of this model. Given the city’s history in relation to workers’ rights and as the home of the women’s suffrage movement means its legacy is being grossly undermined. What would Manchester suffragette Emmeline Pankhurst, or economist Martha Beatrice Webb, the woman who coined the term “collective bargaining”, make of fast fashion? We can only imagine.

A human disaster Emmeline and Beatrice would have followed closely was the 1911 Triangle shirtwaist blaze, which consumed the eighth floor of a garment factory in New York City’s Greenwich Village, killing 146 workers — most of them young women and girls. The owners of the factory escaped the fire unharmed. They were later brought up on charges of manslaughter, but acquitted of negligence.

The New York fire, and the sensational trial that followed, catalysed reforms such as outward-swinging exit doors and sprinklers in high-rise buildings. It would go on to inspire sweeping changes and fuel the women’s suffrage movements in the US and UK. Some have pointed to that day as the birth of the New Deal.

The blaze would be New York’s deadliest workplace disaster for nearly 90 years, and stand as one of the fashion industry’s most catastrophic events, until it’s eclipse in 2013 by the Rana Plaza factory collapse in Dhaka, Bangladesh, which claimed the lives of 1,134 and injured more than 2,500.

These two events, a century apart, reveal how the inequality and poor working conditions once associated with New York and Manchester of the early 20th century have not been eradicated — they have become common to South Asian countries, and among further parallels it emerges once again those at the top of the chain profiting from the deprivation of women and girls are getting off unscathed.

What brands say versus what they do

What Boohoo say: “we need to continue to have a positive social impact” (source)

What they do: Boohoo has not yet published a supplier factory list or signed the Transparency pledge, actions which would help to support monitoring down its supply chain and encourage human rights to be upheld in garment factories worldwide. Boohoo’s code of conduct and supplier manual state suppliers are required to pay only the minimum wage and make no mention of wages being enough to meet basic needs. Since “no evidence of a living wage being paid to any workers” was shown, it garnered an ‘E’ (the lowest) grade in 2019’s Tailored Wages report, provided by the Clean Clothes Campaign.

In its annual report Boohoo has said it will conduct a third-party audit of three-quarters of its global supply chain in FY21.

* What In The Style say: “we’re not saying buy it once and throw it away, we’re saying buy it once and make it last” (source)

What they do: Again, there are transparency issues, with the brand failing to respond to enquiries as to how many garments it makes per year, what it does with unsold stock, whether workers who make the clothes are paid a living wage, or whether samples it produces in the fitting process ultimately end up in landfill. (via Dazed Digital)

* What Missguided say: “suppliers should demonstrate care and concern for people and the environment” (source)

What they do: The retailer releases about 1,000 new products monthly. Lacking transparency around its factory locations and wages paid to workers, Missguided has joined the ETI and is trying to be seen to update its ethical policy, but its approach to buying may prove a barrier to ensuring workers are not exploited. As with Boohoo, “no evidence of a living wage being paid to any workers” was shown, thus it received an ‘E’ grade. (Vox; Clean Clothes Campaign)

Our voices matter

Fast fashion’s practices defy the way in which British consumers would choose to treat people or the natural environment. Who would put a woman through a degrading existence, or agree to pollution on a global scale, all to pay a few pounds less?

2020 seems to be the year of facing hard truths — that we, through uninformed choices and acceptance of the status quo are participants in systems which perpetuate inequality. The women and men who buy fast fashion clothing, the influencers who promote it, the judging panels that present the brands with fashion accolades, and the editors who place their products in magazine spreads, before they show support should ask:

Who made these clothes? Were they paid a living wage? Is the brand’s supply chain suitably transparent? Are all workers who supply this brand permitted to join a union?

As citizens, we must start looking at facts, evidentiary outcomes and concrete metrics, rather than awarding credit for interim steps or intentions.

Crucially it’s the fashion brands themselves that must change NOW. Instead of mindless profit posting, they must show evidence of improvement. We must encourage them to put their profit to good use as leaders in fast fashion, positioning themselves right at the front of the fight for ethical supply chains, which are enabled by smart technology and built on safety, transparency and equality; investing into research for more sustainable fabrics, processing and transport; and vitally, hiring experts in the field to support sustainable growth

We love our city and are proud to call it home. As Mancunians and adopted Mancunians, we need to expect more of our own and call for accountability. Are there fast fashion brands not demonstrating best practise in other cities worldwide? Absolutely. But we’re looking to create change on our own doorstep first: making better choices, making noise and doing everything we can to change the narrative.

In forming the Manchester Fashion Movement, the solidarity has given us hope and confidence. Together we champion people over profits, collaboration over competition and equality at every level of the fashion supply chain.

Now is the time to ask brands for more: to wake up to the lessons of our history and to really give thought for the rights of millions of workers down the value supply chain.

Join us in helping to create awareness and encourage everyday activism. This is our modern suffrage — to turn the tide on fast fashion, and build a garment trade that is safe and fair… for everyone.

Sign up to the Manchester Fashion Movement and keep notified with monthly newsletters: www.manchesterfashionmovement.com

Follow all MFM founders: @manchesterfashionmovement

Gemma — @thebeethrive & @_corporatehippy_

Alison — @allypallyvintage &@sustainablefashionparty

Camilla — @wardrobe_wellbeing_