Madam, - A range of clothing inspired by Kate Moss goes on sale at Topshop, with hundreds of young people queuing up to buy these clothes. The media have highlighted the fact that Topshop is using a confirmed drug user to boost their sales.
A much more fundamental ethical issue seems to go unnoticed however. Topshop is part of the Arcadia Group, owned by the family of billionaire Philip Green. According to Ethical Consumer magazine these clothes are made under the following working conditions: low wages, excessive working hours, job insecurity, verbal and physical abuse by supervisors, poor health and safety conditions, union repression. Overtime is compulsory and underpaid or unpaid, and the targets set are too high.
Are our young people aware of how they contribute to these unfair and unjust conditions when they make their purchase on the high street? Is the Arcadia group concerned about its unjust treatment of employees as it goes in search of its next billion? And where are the media in their reporting of these injustices? Other shops in that group are: - Burton Menswear, Dorothy Perkins, Evans, Miss Selfridge and Wallis. - Yours, etc,
ANN LYNCH, Mercy Justice Office, Kempton Park, Ballyvolane, Cork.