Violating freedom of association

A new report by the Human Rights Watch has just been published on the much discussed subject of Wal-Mart and their seemingly endless struggle to avoid unionisation.

The basis of the report is to suggest the United States’ has failed to uphold international law in relation to workers’ rights.

As a consequence of such governmental inaction, employers have been allowed to breach their own obligation to respect workers’ rights.

What is more, the report argues, employers such as Wal-Mart can violate their employees’ basic rights with virtual impunity.

A short paragraph sums up the nature of the report:

"Wal-Mart is a case study in what is wrong with US labor laws. It is not alone among US companies in its efforts to combat union formation, following the incentives set out in unbalanced US labor laws that tilt the playing field decidedly in favor of anti-union agitation. It is also not alone in violating weak US labor laws and taking advantage of ineffective labor law enforcement. But Wal-Mart stands out for the sheer magnitude and aggressiveness of its anti-union apparatus and actions."

For more details see Discounting Rights: Wal-Mart's Violation of US Workers’ Right to Freedom of Association.

Further details and multi-media reports can be found here.

Working for Lidl

An article in The Guardian's G2 section yesterday took readers into the world of Lidl, one of the fastest expanding food retail outlets in the UK.

The article - Cheap - but not so cheerful? (Helen Pidd) - reveals a side of Lidl that many of its shoppers are unlikely to know about.

The spur for investigating employees experience of work at Lidl seems to be The Black Book on Lidl in Europe by Andreas Hamann und Gudrun Giese.

The book in itself is highly critical of what are seen as aggressively expanding discount businesses in Europe.

An employee's perspective is just one dimension of the book, as the following statement suggests:

"With its expansion Lidl is not only exporting the uniform design of the Lidl stores. Numerous reports of employees from packing staff to management make it clear that Lidl also wants to establish its company culture in the new markets. Mercyless work pressure, permanent shortage of staff, small wages, enormous general pressure and unfair checks, that’s what employees experience daily also abroad from Finland to Italy, from Portugal to Poland."

The findings from the article seem to confirm the findings of the book.

Compare and contrast what Lidl have to offer new employees with the article and the book here.