North American group Alliance has rejected the “misrepresented and oversimplified” report by the workers’ rights groups on safety improvement assessment in Bangladesh’s garment sector. “There is no doubt that the Alliance has had a transformative impact in strengthening the structural integrity of Bangladeshi factories where millions of women and men make a living each day,” said Ellen O’Kane Tauscher, independent chair of the board of the Alliance. “We have proven this strong commitment to improving workplace safety in Bangladesh’s garment industry through concrete actions and results,” she said. On Monday, International Labor Rights Forum, Worker Rights Consortium, Clean Clothes Campaign, and Maquila Solidarity Network in an analysis titled Dangerous Delays on Worker Safety criticised “considerable delays” in repairing safety defects in factories supplying member companies of the Alliance. It claimed that Alliance overstated progress in Bangladesh’s garment sector, keeping its workers’ lives at risk. “Walmart, Gap, VF, Target and Hudson’s Bay have failed to address deadly hazards in many factories, but Bangladesh alliance downplays the problem with rosy status reports,” the workers’ rights groups said in the analysis. “Even more concerning is the fact that the Alliance overstates progress, saying many of the factories listed as on track on the Alliance website still face major safety hazards,” the analysis said. However, Alliance defended their efforts saying the remediation work would be largely completed by 2018. “We project that our remediation work will be largely completed by 2018—as originally planned. We continue to stress that remediation is not an end point, but a continuing journey. Factories and other key stakeholders must take up the charge to continue the culture of safety well beyond 2018,” said Ellen O’Kane Tauscher. Alliance alleged that the right groups in several areas of the report “misrepresented and oversimplified” the complexities of the Alliance and the Accord efforts. “It is important to note that the factories highlighted in the report are those producing products for both Alliance and Accord brands,” it added. Alliance said: “Our analysis of factory remediation progress reflects the conclusions of qualified and trained engineers who are working diligently with factories to ensure they have proper fire safety equipment, conduct inspections and verify progress.” “These inspections are rigorous, and to date, we have suspended 101 factories from the Alliance list for failing to make sufficient progress on remediation—a considerably higher number than factories suspended by either the National Action Plan or the Accord.”
