24th April marked the 10th anniversary of the Rana Plaza building collapse, an incident of industrial homicide that found global fashion brands complicit in the deaths of well over 1000 garment workers and which left thousands more with life changing injuries.

No Sweat has been commemorating this tragic event as part of the Rana Plaza Solidarity Collective, holding a series of protests and events throughout the month.

In this episode Andrew speaks with Nav about her recent trip to Bangladesh where she visited the site of the collapse and met with trade union leaders and workers to discuss how we can support them. Then we head to Toynbee Hall for a live discussion with Mayisha and the TUC's Afzal Rahman about what actually happened on that fateful day, and what has been done since to stop it from ever happening again.

References in this episode:

Rana Plaza Solidarity Collective

Trade Union Congress (TUC)

Nijjor Manush

Taslima Akhter

Bangladesh Garment Worker Solidarity

Bangladesh Garment and Industrial Workers Federation

Rainbow Collective

Tears in the Fabric

Altab Ali Park

Toynbee Hall

Workers Rights Consortium

Labour Behind the Label

Apsana Begum MP

In this final episode of season one, Andrew, Nav and Mayisha reflect on the amazing people they have met in the course of making this podcast, before we descend the steps of London's iconic 100 Club for a special live episode. Plus, Nav gives us the inside scoop on a special protest that disrupted Boohoo's greenwashing fashion event.

In our live show, Andrew sits down with Burmese academic and human rights activist, Dr Maung Zarni, to discuss the latest situation in Myanmar where people are taking up arms against the military dictatorship, and then speaks with Dr Antony Stewart & Aïda Roumer from the Haiti Support group about Western imperialism and garment worker protests in Haiti. Finally the show wouldn't be complete without a little comedy from our host, Andrew O'Neill, upcoming comedian, Sunjai Arif and the legendary Mark Thomas.

References in this episode:

Haiti Support Group

Dr Zarni on Twitter

Batay Ouvriye

All Burma Federation of Trade Unions

Protesting Boohoo

The 100 Club

No Sweat Website

In this episode we delve into the murky world of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and take a closer look at social auditing by speaking to the people exposing how it has failed.

We hear from Amelia Evans, Executive Director at MSI Integrity that conducted a ten year study into multi-stakeholder initiatives and their ability to protect human rights, and from Sarah Newell, Director of Transnational Strategies at the WSR Network, which has developed an alternative system called Worker-Driven Social Responsibility, that is challenging the status quo and putting workers in the driving seat when it comes to ethical change in the workplace.

Sources and organisations referenced in the episode:

• Not Fit For Purpose - MSI Integrity's report
• Beyond Corporations - MSI Integrity's latest project
• Worker-Driven Social Responsibility Network
• Worker Rights Consortium
• Coalition of Immokalee Workers
• Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh
• Workers’ Rights Watch in Lesotho
• Milk with Dignity
• Building Dignity and Respect
• Investigation into labour abuse in UK fishing
• Mondragon Corporation
• No Sweat T-shirt Project

In this uncharacteristically short episode, the gang set their sights on the 2022 World Cup for a little chat about the shocking conditions of workers in Qatar and the hypocritical attitude taken by mainstream media in the Global North. Plus, Andrew treats us to one of their very own punk songs.

Get involved in No Sweat by contacting us at nosweat.org.uk.

Trigger warning: gender-based violence, sexual assault, femicide.

In this episode we learn about a young Indian garment worker called Jeyasre Kathiravel, who was brutally murdered by her supervisor at a factory producing for major Western brands.

Her death has inspired a global campaign against Gender-Based Violence and Harassment (GBVH) in the garment industry, and a fight for change in the factory she worked at, initiated by her friends and colleagues and her trade union, the TTCU.

We hear from the trade union activists and campaigners that formed the Justice for Jeyasre campaign and hear how they empowered their fellow workers to fight for better conditions and held one of the world's largest brands to account for Jeyasre's death and the conditions in the factory.

Sources reference in this episode

Justice for Jeyasre campaign

Tamil Nadu Textile and Common Labour Union (TTCU)

Asian Floor Wage Alliance (AFWA)

Global Labor Justice-International Labor Rights Forum (GLJ-ILRF)

Article in The Guardian

In this episode we take a close look at what is happening in Myanmar (also know as Burma). Since February 2021 the people of Myanmar have been fighting against a military coup, a struggle in which garment workers took a leading role in the early days.

We meet a brave Burmese trade union leader who, on behalf of the tens of thousands of garment workers that her organisation represents in Myanmar, is calling for brands to make a responsible exit from the country and for the international community to impose comprehensive economic sanctions.

Sources referenced

Business and Human Rights Resource Centre Tracker

No Sweat's Myanmar Solidarity webpage

Puma pay workers in Russian stores while they are closed

Organisations Referenced

Global Women's Strike

Myanmar Military: Never in Fashion

MAP Foundation

Industrial Workers Federation Myanmar (IWFM)

Confederation of Trade Unions Myanmar (CTUM)

Federation of Trade Unions of Burma (FTUB, now known as CTUM)

International Labor Organization (ILO)

Food Not Bombs Myanmar

The Rebel Riot

Andrew, Nav and Mayisha find out about sweatshops in Haiti and meet someone leading the fight for change.

Yannick Etienne is a labour rights activist with Batay Ouvriye (meaning Workers' Fight in English), a trade union federation that has been organising sweatshop workers in Haiti for over 20 years.

We learn about the pressures on workers to make ends meet on poverty wages and the protests that have taken place, calling for living wage.

Sources referenced in this episode:

https://nosweat.org.uk/haiti/

https://haitisupportgroup.org/

https://sourcingjournal.com/topics/labor/haiti-garment-workers-minimum-wage-1500-gourdes-industriall-unions-328582/

Meet Andrew O'Neill, award winning comedian and host of this podcast who, with a hint of humour, will take listeners on a journey into the underbelly of capitalism, navigating the world of sweatshop labour and exploitation in the garment industry.

Andrew is guided by seasoned No Sweat activists Mayisha Begum and Navpreet Kaur Singh, through the issues faced by garment workers in the Global South.

In this first episode the team tackle the basics of what sweatshops are, and who exactly is this activist group called No Sweat that have been fighting against them.

Sources referenced in this episode:

https://nosweat.org.uk/

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-53481253

https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2019/oct/14/workers-making-lululemon-leggings-claim-they-are-beaten

https://reports.retail-week.com/green-is-the-new-black/index.html