After thirty years campaigning to reform the clothing industry socially and environmentally, Katharine Hamnett welcomes the government Environmental Audit Committee (EAC) report released today on the sustainability of the fashion industry. The report makes legislative recommendations for forcing the industry to clean up its act and smarter ways that consumers can buy and use clothes. The report is an important step in the right direction. However, the scale of the Human Rights and Environmental problems caused by the industry is catastrophic and the law needs to go further, as Katharine outlines in her response to the report:
“The conclusion I have come to, having tried to change the industry from within, is that fair pay, decent work, proper health and safety, human rights, and higher environmental standards impact bottom line profits and therefore brands are mostly unwilling to change. Our only option is legislation, forcing the industry to change in line with consumer expectations and environmental necessity. Labour standards, raw material procurement, chemical use, effluent treatment, waste and animal welfare are some of the areas of greatest risk in the clothing industry. Outside of fulfilling basic legal requirements, brands are left to self-regulate across all of these areas. Time has shown that self-regulation has had devastating consequences. We need a stronger, holistic legislation in the interests of farmers, supply chain workers, brand employees, consumers and our communities as a matter of urgency – legislation that only allows goods into our Economic Blocs that are made to the same Labour, Human Rights, Health and Safety and Environmental standards, outside as inside. For example: 1. We need labour standards that do not harm workers in clothing supply chains, that enforce true living wages so that garment workers and farmers can have a standard of living beyond basic subsistence and that mandates the freedom to join a trade union so that they may have their voices heard and acted upon. 2. We need products that protect consumers and the environment from toxic substances used in clothing, footwear and textiles and raw material processing; pesticides, fertilisers, teflon, chlorine bleach, chrome, heavy metals, sulphuric acid, phthalates, parabens and PVC are among the worst examples. REACH, the EU regulation that governs the production and use of chemical substances is collapsing or at least failing to protect us, as brands source textiles and raw materials outside the EU where chemical restrictions are not enforced. We need to ban the import of raw materials and textiles that are not in compliance with REACH and we need to toughen up REACH. Legislation that only allows goods into our Economic Blocs that are made to the same high standard outside as inside, will level the playing field between outsourced and domestically produced goods, enable local production, create jobs, preserve traditional skills and cut the industry’s carbon footprint. We are proposing this idea as a basis for new EU legislation and in the event of Brexit, British legislation as well”.
Read a summary of the EAC report findings here and full report here.
