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Mike Ashley Uncovered: An Inside Out Special


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http://www.sundaysun.co.uk/news/north-east-news//tm_headline=mike-ashley-s-sporting-empire-probed%26method=full%26objectid=25723173%26siteid=79310-name_page.html

 

Mike Ashley's sporting empire probed

 

Jan 31 2010 by Coreena Ford, Sunday Sun

 

SENSATIONAL claims that clothes sold by Toon owner Mike Ashley’s company have been made in Third World sweatshops are to be uncovered in a shocking documentary tonight.

 

BBC’s Inside Out team lifts the lid on Sports Direct, the company that made Ashley his fortune, and discovers workers paid around £1 a day for a 12-hour shift making clothes to be sold in the business mogul’s stores.

 

Sports Direct – which raised a reported £2.2bn when it was floated in 2007 – commissions many of its own branded goods, including Donnay, Slazenger, Lonsdale, Karrimor and Everlast, from third party manufacturers in South East Asia through agents.

 

Inside Out presenter Chris Jackson flew to Thailand where he found many garments allegedly come at a high personal cost to the workers who make them.

 

In Bangkok, he was told that KH Textiles, a major supplier to Sports Direct, was raided by police for employing 162 illegal workers from Laos and Burma, who were all deported.

 

Sports Direct’s website makes claims of “corporate social responsibility”, stating it sources its merchandise from manufacturers who can show that they uphold “ethical employment and trading practices”.

 

The website also claims the company has a code of ethics which it requires every supplier to follow.

 

The code states: “Amongst other matters the code provides for fair treatment of workers and their wages, non-use of child labour, safe and healthy systems of work and no use of illegal means or materials in the production of goods.

 

Chris Jackson also went to neighbouring Laos, where he poses as a potential client at a factory that makes clothes which appear to be for the Lonsdale brand, and finds a building packed with rows of workers.

 

Only one part of the building is air-conditioned, apparently to keep the machinery cool.

 

The documentary also shows Chris being offered three sample tops, which appear to be Mike Ashley’s Lonsdale brand. The manager tells him the shirt, excluding the cost of material and transport, costs around 25p to make and sells for £13.

 

Price tags can also be seen already attached to a sweatshirt boasting a 70% discount tag, before it has even left the factory.

 

A researcher for Inside Out also interviews a woman who works at another factory said to supply Sports Direct, who claims to share a factory dormitory with 38 other women.

 

She works from 8am to 8pm with an hour’s break, yet only received 50 Baht - around £1 - a day. The woman also alleges that work-related injuries are often only dealt with by taking painkillers and if a worker has to go to hospital because of an injury, he or she must meet the medical costs.

 

Last year Mike Ashley controversially announced plans to rename the club’s ground sportsdirect.com@St. James’ Park Stadium, but critics say shareholders may want to distance themselves from the sportswear label.

 

United fan Doug Miller, Northumbria University’s Chair of Ethical Fashion, said: “If we’re going to have a brand name in front of it then you want that brand to be a clean brand.”

 

Inside Out asked to speak to Mike Ashley but this was declined.

 

A spokesman for Sports Direct said Inside Out had made a number of claims and statements that were both inaccurate and misleading.

 

The spokesman said neither Sports Direct nor Mike Ashley would comment but they would be watching today’s programme closely.

 

Newcastle United also declined to comment.

 

V Mike Ashley Uncovered: an Inside Out Special, is on BBC1 in the North East tonight at 10.25pm.

 

Nike, Primark, etc. have all been accused of doing the same thing. It always gets blamed on the factory they sub-contract to. Fact is, people always want to pay the lowest price possible.

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Workers on 6 pound a week with a weeks money deducted if they take a day off at one end of the scale. Footballers on 60,000 a week at the other end of the operation whether they turn up or not.

A great advert for the fairness of free market values.

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http://www.sundaysun.co.uk/news/north-east-news//tm_headline=mike-ashley-s-sporting-empire-probed%26method=full%26objectid=25723173%26siteid=79310-name_page.html

 

Mike Ashley's sporting empire probed

 

Jan 31 2010 by Coreena Ford, Sunday Sun

 

SENSATIONAL claims that clothes sold by Toon owner Mike Ashley’s company have been made in Third World sweatshops are to be uncovered in a shocking documentary tonight.

 

Fuck off, I thought football shirts and stuff were sold at cost price & all sportswear was individually handcrafted. :frantic:

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http://www.sundaysun.co.uk/news/north-east-news//tm_headline=mike-ashley-s-sporting-empire-probed%26method=full%26objectid=25723173%26siteid=79310-name_page.html

 

Mike Ashley's sporting empire probed

 

Jan 31 2010 by Coreena Ford, Sunday Sun

 

SENSATIONAL claims that clothes sold by Toon owner Mike Ashley’s company have been made in Third World sweatshops are to be uncovered in a shocking documentary tonight.

 

f*** off, I thought football shirts and stuff were sold at cost price & all sportswear was individually handcrafted. :frantic:

does anyone think if ashley hadn't been a football club chairman this documentary wouldn't have been made ?
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Workers on 6 pound a week with a weeks money deducted if they take a day off at one end of the scale. Footballers on 60,000 a week at the other end of the operation whether they turn up or not.

A great advert for the fairness of free market values.

 

If you go to matches or buy merchandise, you are just as responsible - if you don't like the system, boycott it...but how many will ?

As for the 'Free Market', what about the Zils that the hierarchy in the Soviet Union used to ride around in whilst the plebs were making do with the oh-so-reliable Moskvitch ??

Fans of Socialism are like St Augustine  - 'Oh Lord, give me chastity - but don't give it YET..!' They want it to happen, but not for themselves.

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f*** off, I thought football shirts and stuff were sold at cost price & all sportswear was individually handcrafted. :frantic:

 

I seem to remember somebody bragging in a Spanish brothel that the club paid £5 for a football shirt and sold them to us mugs.  Of course the manufacturer could have been selling thousands of shirts at a loss.

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If you go to matches or buy merchandise, you are just as responsible - if you don't like the system, boycott it...but how many will ?

As for the 'Free Market', what about the Zils that the hierarchy in the Soviet Union used to ride around in whilst the plebs were making do with the oh-so-reliable Moskvitch ??

Fans of Socialism are like St Augustine  - 'Oh Lord, give me chastity - but don't give it YET..!' They want it to happen, but not for themselves.

 

It's not just merchandise, it's almost every item of clothing we buy and a lot of the food that we eat.  This story is just bullshit because they are looking at a tiny part of a massive problem.  I would rather produce football shirts for £1 than do many of the worse jobs that people in these countries have to do for even less money.

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http://www.sundaysun.co.uk/news/north-east-news//tm_headline=mike-ashley-s-sporting-empire-probed%26method=full%26objectid=25723173%26siteid=79310-name_page.html

 

Mike Ashley's sporting empire probed

 

Jan 31 2010 by Coreena Ford, Sunday Sun

 

SENSATIONAL claims that clothes sold by Toon owner Mike Ashleys company have been made in Third World sweatshops are to be uncovered in a shocking documentary tonight.

 

f*** off, I thought football shirts and stuff were sold at cost price & all sportswear was individually handcrafted. :frantic:

does anyone think if ashley hadn't been a football club chairman this documentary wouldn't have been made ?

 

And do you think the Sunday Sun would have written a nothing article like that had they not had the fall out with Ashley a couple of weeks ago?

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31/Jan/10 

 

Newcastle owner Mike Ashley in TV bashing - Brian McNally, The Mirror

Mike Ashley's running of Newcastle United is heavily criticised in a BBC television expose to be broadcast tonight.

Former Newcastle plc chairman Denis Cassidy accuses the Toon owner of not understanding football or managers such as Kevin Keegan, Sam Allardyce and Alan Shearer on the Inside Out North East special, Mike Ashley Uncovered.

And BBC pundit Mark Lawrenson blasts Ashley for bringing in Dennis Wise during the Keegan reign.

 

Lawrenson says: “If all of a sudden you put your mates in charge you are just going to alienate everybody at the football club. To be honest he couldn’t have done a worse job if he’d been King Herod.”

 

Cassidy reveals that Harry Redknapp turned down Ashley’s overtures to succeed Sam Allardyce in 2008 because he didn’t like the club’s command structure.

 

Cassidy claimed: “Harry Redknapp was seen. He went up to Newcastle and was interviewed. He decided that set-up wasn’t for him. He didn’t like it.

And he accuses the Sports Direct retailer of being out of his depth when it comes to football management.

 

He added: “He patently knew about football shirts and football boots which he sold, but not much about football. He doesn’t understand inter-personal relationships in a complex business and high paid managers and players.”

 

Wigan owner Dave Whelan blames Ashley for lowering standards in the St James’ Park boardroom.

 

Whelan said: “He changed everything in the Newcastle boardroom, people were coming in in jeans and replica shirts. That’s not right in a football club.

 

“It is very unusual for a chairman or a director to go into the crowd and drink beer with the fans. That is short term to disaster.”

 

And Lawrenson reveals his BBC mate Alan Shearer didn’t realise just what a mess Newcastle were in until he accepted the manager’s job on a short-term contract last April.

Lawrenson also believes Ashley was guilty of “bad manners” by snubbing Shearer after Newcastle were relegated.

Lawrenson added: “I think it hurt him. I think he seriously thought they could avoid relegation.”

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Rather than have YET ANOTHER story about how certain brands use manufacturing processes in the third world, maybe BBC North East could treat us to an expose of how much it cost them (or us as licence payers) to send Chris Jackson all around the world just to state the f*cking obvious once again.

 

They have been running this "sensational" story as the headline on their hourly news bulletins today. There can't be much else happening in the world.

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/football/teams/n/newcastle_united/8487075.stm

 

A BBC investigation has followed the supply chain of multi-millionaire Mike Ashley's sportswear retailing business all the way back to one of the world's poorest countries where workers are paid around £1 a day for a twelve hour shift.

 

A special Inside Out programme about the controversial owner of Newcastle United football club, being shown tonight, filmed workers in Laos making clothes for his Sports Direct stores.

 

The factory had one sealed air conditioned room to keep cool a computerised sewing machine which was embroidering dozens of Lonsdale logos.

 

Elsewhere on the site hundreds of people were in long production lines in the heat sewing clothes together ready to be shipped to Mike Ashley's UK stores. They were bagged up - and amazingly even had a 70% discount sticker already added before they left the factory.

 

The manager told the undercover reporters that his factory did not meet the internationally accepted standards for garments workers - known as the SA 8000 standard.

 

It guarantees no child labour is used, and the workers get a living wage without excessive overtime - in a safe and decent environment.

 

The factory manager admitted to meet the standard he would have to improve conditions in the factory - and pay staff more.

 

Many other major sports retailers such as Nike publicly list all their suppliers who all have all passed this test; Sports Direct does not list its suppliers.

 

A spokesman for Mike Ashley told the BBC that the neither the company nor the club would be commenting.

 

They did say that some of the questions the programme makers had written to them about were "inaccurate and misleading" - although they have not said in what way and added they would be watching the programme closely.

 

'Mike Ashley Uncovered - an Inside Out special' is on BBC 1 in the North East & Cumbria region at 10.25 on Sunday, 31 January. Viewers with satellite can watch it live on Sky channel 975. It will also be available on the BBC iPlayer.

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Guest BlacknWhiteArmy

Looking on my sky, it's coming up as "Would I lie to you" even when I go to channel 975.

 

Any ideas if it's just a mistake?

 

Same.

 

I'm just going to have a look at 10.25 and see if it is on.

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http://www.sundaysun.co.uk/news/north-east-news//tm_headline=mike-ashley-s-sporting-empire-probed%26method=full%26objectid=25723173%26siteid=79310-name_page.html

 

Mike Ashley's sporting empire probed

 

Jan 31 2010 by Coreena Ford, Sunday Sun

 

SENSATIONAL claims that clothes sold by Toon owner Mike Ashley’s company have been made in Third World sweatshops are to be uncovered in a shocking documentary tonight.

 

f*** off, I thought football shirts and stuff were sold at cost price & all sportswear was individually handcrafted. :frantic:

does anyone think if ashley hadn't been a football club chairman this documentary wouldn't have been made ?

 

And do you think the Sunday Sun would have written a nothing article like that had they not had the fall out with Ashley a couple of weeks ago?

 

Yes.

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