Source: Campaign for Labor Rights
December 4, 1999

[Compiled from information provided by the National Labor Committee: (212) 242-3002, <nlc@nlcnet.org>
the Maquila Solidarity Network: (416) 532-8584, <info@maquilasolidarity.org>
and United Students Against Sweatshops: (202) 667-9328, <ebrakken@students.wisc.edu>]

LIZ CLAIBORNE WORKERS FIRED FOR ORGANIZING

In the past two weeks, at least 27 workers have been illegally fired from the DOALL factory in El Salvador, which produces garments for the Liz Claiborne, Perry Ellis, Leslie Fay and Norton clothing lines. The workers were fired for exercising their right to organize.

Within days after applying for registration of their union, SETDESA, 10 of 11 union executive members and at least 17 other workers were fired at two DOALL maquila (assembly for export) garment factories in El Salvador's San Marcos free trade zone.

On November 22, the day their application was filed, Union President Rosa Delia Dominguez and Secretary of Organization Maria Magdalena Valladarez de Diaz were asked to sign a statement that they were voluntarily resigning. Both refused. Ms. Valladarez de Diaz was offered 5,000 colones (U.S. $575), including three years severance pay, but she refused to sign or accept the money.

SETDESA and the Salvadoran Workers Central (CTS), to which it is affiliated, are demanding the immediate reinstatement of the fired workers and the elimination of sweatshop practices, including: verbal abuse by supervisors, forced overtime and excessively high work quotas subject to arbitrary increases.

DOALL employees work from 6:50 am to 7:00 pm Monday to Friday and from 7:00 am to 4:00 pm on Saturdays. Average salaries are U.S. $46 a week.

The larger of the two factories produces for Liz Claiborne and other major U.S. labels. Following media exposes of sweatshop conditions at the factory in 1996, a spokesperson for Liz Claiborne pledged that the company would no longer tolerate such abuses.

DOALL workers earn just 74 cents for every $198 Liz Claiborne jacket they sew, and 58 cents for every $118 pair of pants. Factory temperatures reach 100 degrees or more. Permission to use the bathroom is limited to twice a day. The air is filled with fabric dust. There is forced pregnancy testing. Workers are physically searched when they enter and exit the factory. They are denied the use of federal health care clinics. There is constant pressure ­ screaming and yelling ­ to finish the extraordinarily high production goals.

Last spring, 5 workers at the factory were fired after it was discovered that they had met with students from Columbia University who were in El Salvador conducting research on wages in the apparel industry. (Their study found that El Salvador's minimum wage meets just 27 percent of the cost of living for a family of four.) Those workers were told that they were being fired because they "went to cry before the gringos." In August of 1998, 18 workers were fired for challenging the forced overtime at the factory and meeting to discuss organizing a union. In December of 1998, another worker was fired when the factory suspected him of being involved in an organizing
campaign. In January of 1999, 11 DOALL workers were fired for meeting in a public place, indicating that they might be organizing a union. In March of 1999, three more workers were fired without back wages for being suspected of organizing a union, and the next month, two more workers were fired for resisting the mandatory overtime. (The recent history of DOALL is documented in a report called "Fired for Crying to the Gringos" at <www.nlcnet.org/LIZ/FIRED/index.html> on the National Labor Committee web site.)

A monitor from PriceWaterhouseCoopers, a for-profit auditing company which
conducts monitoring visits, gave the factory a clean bill of health after
visiting the factory just days after the January illegal firings, telling
Harvard University students in May that conditions were "just fine" in the
factory. On the PWC visit to the factory, workers did not confide in the
monitors for fear that they would be fired as well.

Liz Claiborne vice president Roberta Karp represents the company on the
Apparel Industry Partnership/Fair Labor Association (AIP/FLA), whose code
mandates respect for the right of freedom of association (the right to join
a union and take part in union activities).

<><><><><>
ACTION REQUEST

Please copy (or adapt), sign and mail or fax the following letter to Liz
Claiborne vice president Roberta Karp and send the signature information
below (not this entire alert!) to Campaign for Labor Rights by email
<CLR@igc.org> or fax (541) 431-0523:

I have sent the letter to Liz Claiborne.
NAME:
CITY & STATE (or COUNTRY if not U.S.):
ORGANIZATION (if applicable):

Ms. Roberta Karp, Vice President
Liz Claiborne, Inc.
1141 Broadway, 8th floor
New York, NY 10018
Fax: (212) 626-3416

Dear Ms. Karp:

I am writing to express my concern about the firing of 10 union executive
committee members and at least 17 other members of the union at two DOALL
apparel factories in El Salvador, the larger of which produces apparel for
your company. The workers were fired between November 22 and 25, a few days
after applying for the registration of their union. Human rights
organizations monitoring the situation report that union members have been
offered severance packages and other benefits if they would sign statements
that they were resigning voluntarily.

These charges are particularly disturbing since your company recently
received positive media attention for releasing a report on working
conditions in one of its contractor factories in Guatemala, a report which
included specific recommendations on steps the supplier needed to take in
order to bring its practices in line with your code of conduct and local
legal requirements. I urge you to apply similar vigilance to what is
happening at the DOALL factory in El Salvador.

Following media coverage of sweatshop abuses at DOALL in 1996, a Liz
Claiborne representative pledged that such practices would no longer be
tolerated. Yet, almost four years later, there are new reports of serious
sweatshop practices at DOALL, including: forced and excessive hours of
overtime, unreasonable production quotas, verbal abuse by supervisors and
forced pregnancy testing.

I urge you to ensure that DOALL respects your company's own code of
conduct, the Apparel Industry Partnership code, to which you are a
signatory, and Salvadoran law concerning the right to freedom of
association without punishment or discrimination. I hope to learn soon that
you have seen to it that the fired union supporters are immediately
reinstated, that DOALL management recognizes the union and that sweatshop
practices are eliminated.

Please note that I are NOT asking Liz Claiborne to end or suspend orders to
the DOALL factory. I are asking that you work with the contractor to ensure
that the rights of workers to organize and bargain collectively are
respected and their right to decent working conditions is guaranteed.

Thank you for your prompt attention to this important matter. I will
continue to follow the situation at DOALL through the reports of credible
human rights organizations.

Sincerely,

<><><><><>