The unacceptable face of 'value'

Purveyors of ultra-cheap fashion-tat to the masses - Primark - have sacked three suppliers in India after they were exposed as employing child labour.

Given that one of the companies has been working for Primark for over twelve years you’ve got to question how much of a surprise this really was.

Not long ago I wrote about being fucked-over at work by one of our big corporate clients. To the extent that we are now in the process of lying people off here. When I told the terribly polite people at the big corporate client that this is what we were doing, there was a look of horror on their faces: In their world when it’s time to 'let people go', they usually just pick up the phone to get someone from HR to do the distasteful task. But in small businesses we get to look someone in the eye and say ‘I’m really sorry but you’re fucked’.

The people at the big corporate client are perfectly nice and well-meaning, they may well be liberal too for all I know. But they are in denial. This enables them to dissociate themselves from the consequences of their actions. And that really pisses me off: I’m not too proud of some of the stuff I have to do these days – like making people redundant – but at least I’m honest about it to them and myself.

A lack of honesty and a cowardice in taking responsibility for your actions is the worst sort of Pontius Pilate-ism that makes possible all kinds of bigger horrors.

If you were in Germany in the 30s it might be not bothering to ask why all the Jewish shops and businesses were disappearing. Nowadays it manifests itself as not worrying where your T-Shirt for under a £1 comes from.