Labour is compulsory for all prisoners in British jails. Those failing to work face punishment including a reduction in status (under the Incentives and Earned Privileges Scheme prisoners are divided into 3 status levels - Basic, Standard and Enhanced) Its nice to see they even have a class system inside!

Prisoners are paid a pittance for what they do - one example given at the meeting was of prisoners receiving 9 quid for a 30 hour week. As great restrictions are now placed on what can be sent in to prisoners, this money will be spent virtually entirely in the prison shop (run by Aramark) where
prices do not exactly compare to your local Tesco.

With prisoners offering such cheap labour, more and more companies are looking to make profits at their expense. Whilst this in itself is immoral and exploitative, it ultimately effects all working class people - why should an employer pay you 300 quid a week, when he can a prisoner less than a tenth of that? Why should an employer have to tip-toe around your legal rights when he can get the prison service to force a prisoner into obediency?

Direct action has already been succesfully used in the UK against companies using prison labour - Hepworths Plumbers in Doncaster withdrew after their premnises were occupied by demonstrators. Most companies are very shy about letting their staff and customers know of their involvement in these practices. These companies are in for a shock.

Sunday 5th April will see a national day of action against prison slavery. Get out and do something in your community. The main focus of demonstrations will be Wilkinson's, just one of the many firms profiting from prison slavery.

To get involved with the campaign:
Email: againstprisonslavery@mail.com
Tel: 07944 522001
Write to: Campaign Against Prison Slavery, Cardigan Centre, 145-149 Cardigan Street, Leeds LS6 1LJ.

CAMPAIGN AGAINST PRISON SLAVERY

Contract labour at Full Sutton Prison - February 2003

HMP Full Sutton near York is part of the maximum security 'disperal' estate, holding adult male long-term prisoners serving anything from aproximately 6 years to Life. Since the prisoners uprising there in January 1997 there have been particularly savage cuts in prisoner education and increased attempts to force prisoners into the 'contract workshops', for example by requiring all prisoners wishing to do education classes to agree to work in them. The Full Sutton workshops have generally carried out fairly short-term contracts for various private companies, including Red Or Dead (who withdrew from their contract there in 1995) and Dysons, the vaccum cleaner manufacturer. After Dysons moved their operation to Malaysia the prisoners at Full Sutton were forced to fold party hats for the Bishop Aukland firm Thompsons Xmas Company. Currently the company exploiting slave labour at Full Sutton is Ard Electronics (Tel - 01282 683000) who use prisoners to package small electronic components. Further information on Thompsons and/or Ard Electronics would be welcome.

WILKINSON'S

Cheap - because we use slave labour

Wilkinsons claim to be a company with a caring outlook, a company working in partnership with local communities, a company with an ethical view. But in contrast to their publicity material, the reality is that rather than offer jobs to the community Wilkinsons  prefer to use the slave labour of a captive non-unionised workforce in order to keep their costs low and their profits high.

Slavery has NOT been abolished in Britain, behind high walls and locked doors it still flourishes. Working class people are being forced to toil in poor conditions, beyond the reach of health and safety inspectors, denied even the most basic employment and trade-union rights, and severely punished if they refuse to work. In British prisons, there have been savage cuts in education budgets over the past half-decade, any pretence at rehabilitating prisoners and empowering them with trade skills has been abandoned. They are now seen as a readily exploitable labour force, a Third World colony in Britains own backyard, cheap, non-unionised, available, and literally compelled to work.

If prisoners refuse to work, or are not considered to be working hard enough, they are punishedplaced in solitary confinement, brutalised, denied visits, having days added to their sentences. Private companies are making enormous profits from prison labour, £52.9 Million in 1999, and that figure is growing rapidly. They use it because it is CHEAPprisoners may be paid less than £5 for a weeks work - and for prisoners there are no sickies, no holidays, no union meetings, no transport problems, and if theres no work they can simply be locked back in their cells. Prisoners are treated as the bosses would like to treat all of us.

Wilkinsons are one of many companies profiting from the slave labour of prisoners. In Swansea prison for example, where prisoners are forced to do packing work for Wilkinsons, prisoners are paid little more than £1 per day. This greedy company would rather use slave labour than give more work to their own workers or employ new ones.

The issue of prison slavery is an issue for ALL working-class people, not least because it undermines workers pay and conditions generally. Not because prisoners are somehow stealing jobs, they have absolutely no choice in the matter, but because companies can drive down the wages of their own employees by using prison labour, and it brings with it the threat of short-time and redundancies. The employees of Dysons, the vacuum-cleaner manufacturer, for example, were thrown out of work when Dysons decided to use cheap non-unionised labour in Malaysia, but how many Dysons workers knew that for some time the company had been using cheap, non-unionised labour at Full Sutton prison? Not surprisingly the latter-day slave-masters are desperate to keep their involvement secret, from their own employees, and from the wider public.

The Campaign Against Prison Slavery exists to challenge and bring about an end to forced prison labour, and to expose the companies that exploit it. In the 21st Century it is high-time that slavery in all its forms was ended for good. Today we are here to shame Wilkinsons.

SAY NO TO SLAVERY SAY NO TO WILKINSONS

Campaign Against Prison Slavery, The Cardigan Centre, Cardigan Road, Leeds, LS6 1LJ.  E-mail: againstprisonslavery@mail.com

We now have a direct e-mail address and phone number for Wilkinson's, so please let them know what you think about their use of prison slavery. 

Telephone: 01909 505505
E-Mail: communications@wilko.co.uk

Another Wilkinson's contact is sarah.taylor@wilko.co.uk