Did you, like me, think Primark...

Primark, Bon Marche and Matalan THIS TIME! They are not the only ones to import from there.

It's the same as Findus were the first named company at time of the horsemeat scandal. Then the whole shooting party were named.

It's a tragedy that was waiting to happen in any part of the country. The saddest fact is the workers there were probably thought to be working in better conditions than a lot of others working from the back street factories.

Will their government do anything now, sadly probably not.

Looking at the amount of clothes DS, DD and DDIL have, most people can afford to pay a fair price for clothes, by just buying less and spending more on the garments they do buy - and while they are at it, they could improve the quality.

I think it was Harold MacMillan who talked about the unacceptable face of capitalism.

Ten years ago I encouraged my then Sunday School class to 'Lift the Label' and find out more about the circumstances in which their clothes were made. This was a Tearfund initiative that had a huge impact upon my class of teenagers. I did think that such campaigns would be usefully taught in schools and a few years later I had the opportunity to do just that during my PSHE lessons; again with an overwhelmingly positive response from my class of teens. The parents however were not so keen; in fact one of them said she wished she hadn't been told (by her teenager) about the harsh conditions of the workers (many of them children) because she would have a guilty conscience when continuing to buy cheap clothes!

It isn't just Primark, apparently Matalan and Bon Marche (sp?) use the same building.

Meant to say "like........(they) say"

Like Absent and others - this is the true price of "cheap" clothing. It is exploitative and immoral and should be made much more public. When you think of the conditions these people have to work in just so that somebody in this country can have a £5 t-shirt, it is shameful.

Eloethan and FlicketyB you are both so obviously right in what you say. No one with one ounce of common sense could really convince themselves that Primark clothes could be sold at the prices they are sold at without massive, possibly dangerous exploitation taking place, presumably somewhere else on the world.

How can clothes be as cheap as they are if there is not exploitation somewhere in the system?

I didn't think that much would have changed, despite Primark's reassurances, because people were still piling into the shop so it was obvious everything remained dirt cheap. The only way goods can be manufactured so cheaply is by stinting on wages and working conditions.

Those poor people - and their families.

It is dreadful to think that concerns were raised but people were made to go in and work anyway.

The idea that extra floors were added is quite bizarre and calls into question the prevailing planning and building regs legislation in that area.

There has to be concern about such cheap clothes as Primark produce as that can only be achieved with very low wages. I am not sure though that it is fair to condemn them concerning the building - if you rent a factory it is reasonable to assume that the building is safe. Let us hope they will check that aspect in future.

Of course if they were part of the process of forcing people to go into a building where there were known safety concerns that is completely unacceptable.

they have said on the news that Primark used this factory for some of their clothes. It makes me sick to think that the workers were made to enter a condemned building to make clothes for Europe. Cheap in money but not in lives.