Anyone live in Leicester? The lockdown there has been extended.

The "Businesses" in question can only be investigated by the local authority or the Health & Safety Executive etc if they are registered with Companies House and in that declare accounts.

As many of these "operations" are not compliant with the above, it becomes a police matter which I suspect they do not wish to be too much involved with for obvious reasons.

Very well put Iam64
Totally agree.
?

Random H&S inspections alone would shut down most of these sweatshops. I read this morning that toilet facilities are often disgraceful with only one toilet for 50 workers.
?

The business owners probably live in big gated houses outside the perimeter of the source of their income. Morally and socially wrong in the U.K. in this day and age. Come on Leicester Council ... DO SOMETHING!

Iam64

The baffling thing as kittylester says, is why a joint investigation of the relevant authorities hasn't resulted in raids on these factories. The news reports today suggest many of those employed on £3 an hour may be here illegally, living in over crowded poor housing conditions so working and living in close proximity with poor hygiene available. The same workers are trying to send money to their families, who stayed in their homeland.
My concern isn't the legal status of the workforce, its the exploitation of those people by 'respectable' business leaders. These 'employees' are in no position to involve Unite or any other union. Cause any trouble, don't work flat out and there's no job for you.
Where are Trading Standards, Health and Safety Executive etc? I read two such factories were closed yesterday.

Thank you Iam that would sum it up for me.

The baffling thing as kittylester says, is why a joint investigation of the relevant authorities hasn't resulted in raids on these factories. The news reports today suggest many of those employed on £3 an hour may be here illegally, living in over crowded poor housing conditions so working and living in close proximity with poor hygiene available. The same workers are trying to send money to their families, who stayed in their homeland.
My concern isn't the legal status of the workforce, its the exploitation of those people by 'respectable' business leaders. These 'employees' are in no position to involve Unite or any other union. Cause any trouble, don't work flat out and there's no job for you.
Where are Trading Standards, Health and Safety Executive etc? I read two such factories were closed yesterday.

John Lyttle is joint CEO with Mahmud Kamani who founded the company (Boohoo) with Carol Kane in 2006.

I live in Leicestershire and I knew about sweatshops in different areas of the city. If I knew, why did the authorities not know and do something about it.

It baffles me that it is common knowledge on the ground and yet nothing is done.

And if we’re talking about sexual grooming and exploitation then look no further than recent headlines and a certain royal.

Absolutely growstuff. I don’t understand the racist overtones as if Asian communities have the sole preserve on exploitation.

Consider Trump and the Mexican workers in meat processing plants in the US. Exactly the same scenario but ordered back to work during their ‘lockdown’ by the far right President.

Furret

growstuff

tickingbird

Lemon All if of us with open minds know why this situation is allowed to continue. It’s the same reason the council turned a blind eye in Rotherham and Rochdale. Didn’t want to rock the boat and risk losing their core voters. The exploitation of people is allowed to continue and the silence is deafening from the liberal left!

Please explain what you mean.

Probably a covert reference to the Asian community? These were authorities where Asian men groomed mainly white girls.

Though the reference to ‘open minds’ and ‘if of’ baffles me.

Baffling! The owners of the factories have been exploiting their workers, as have the fast-fashion labels, whom they were supplying. I really don't see any connection with Pakistani grooming gangs. This is all about plain, old-fashioned capitalism and exploitation. The ethnicity of factory owners is irrelevant.

It's good to see that people have become more aware and hopefully will support measures to ensure that the workers (mainly of Asian origin) in Leicester are treated more fairly.

John Lyttle, the multi-millionaire owner of Boohoo, which has made a fortune from exploiting small businesses and workers in Leicester.

If you read this, you’ll see the Govt knew all about the sweat shops at least two years ago and failed to take any action.
www.ft.com/content/0b26ee5d-4f4f-4d57-a700-ef49038de18c

MerylStreep - what is obvious here is that you are just plain rude.

You should try and be more respectful in future if you want others to treat you with respect.

Ramblingrose
You obviously have no idea how some council officials and local business works.
Unfortunately you won't find any emails or texts asking for favours in return for other favours nudge nudge, wink wink.
I will say no more as it would be construed as slanderous, but it's good to see that several of us know what's been going on.
But it won't stop.

tickingbird - I wouldn't have the time to moderate the other threads. I don't spend all my time on Gransnet you know!

Contrary to what you may think, I don't pounce on or pick on anyone in particular. It all depends on when I happen to be looking at Gransnet on any particular day so it's completely random.

Mamardoit isn't the first one on here whose assertions I've challenged and I expect that she won't be the last.

If people make dodgy or questionable assertions on here then they should expect to be questioned or challenged.

It's a pity that you seem to have a problem with that.

Nothing covert about it!

growstuff

tickingbird

Lemon All if of us with open minds know why this situation is allowed to continue. It’s the same reason the council turned a blind eye in Rotherham and Rochdale. Didn’t want to rock the boat and risk losing their core voters. The exploitation of people is allowed to continue and the silence is deafening from the liberal left!

Please explain what you mean.

Probably a covert reference to the Asian community? These were authorities where Asian men groomed mainly white girls.

Though the reference to ‘open minds’ and ‘if of’ baffles me.

A pity you don’t moderate the other threads Rambling Rose. Plenty of assertions about all sorts of people on some of them. None of them backed up with evidence so I don’t know why you’ve pounced on Marmadoit on this particular thread!

The words in bold from that post were copied from another post earlier in this thread. I just added the second half.

Mamardoit - I was hoping to see your evidence about the factory bosses connected to the "people who run Leicester".

I'm all for shutting down the sweatshops and exposing the collusion of city bigwigs but you shouldn't make assertions if you can't even back them up.

I hear from those who are involved that the outbreak in Barrow inFurness links to a group who visited a region in Italy where covid was active, though that wasn't known at the time of the trip.

As for the sweatshops in Leicester, I'm inclined to agree with those who say go in hard and heavy. It seems likely (indisputable) that employment laws, if nothing else, have been breached in these manufacturing outlets.

It seems likely that there has been widespread fraud and that needs jumping on. If there is modern slavery involved, even more so.

twitter.com/stephenctimms/status/1265749700281618432?lang=en

i think this is the question i referred to above, re NRPF.

maybe some of the sweatshop workers have
No Recourse to Public Funds
so they would have to go on working, or else not be able to pay rent, buy food, top up energy key, etc.
when stephen timms MP asked PM in a cttee mtg about a couple like this in his area, who were destitute and had NRPF, the PM suggested they apply for universal credit.
it was painful to watch.
don't suppose PM has ever done much ?any constituency case work, as he seemed totally unaware of NRPF.
guess he's always got some eager beaver unpaid volunteer to do it for him, which actually probably gives a better service to constituents.
i've seen that kind of situation in other constituencies.

Has Barrow-in-Furness been locked down too?

Why is there such a high infection rate in Barrow-in-Furness? Is a blind eye being turned to something there too?

tickingbird

Lemon All if of us with open minds know why this situation is allowed to continue. It’s the same reason the council turned a blind eye in Rotherham and Rochdale. Didn’t want to rock the boat and risk losing their core voters. The exploitation of people is allowed to continue and the silence is deafening from the liberal left!

Please explain what you mean.

Yes, it certainly looks that way ticking☹️