United Kingdom

Secretive new political firm set up by ‘posh’ George Cottrell raises ‘real red flags’, anti-corruption expert warns

Source: https://www.reuters.com/world/uk/luigi-mangione-accused-us-ceo-murder-depicted-london-mural-2025-02-26/

The story at that link is about 1 month old, but someone posted about this mural on Reddit yesterday.

Thoughts?

I saw this on Reddit and thought it was interesting.

One in four Gen Zs have thought about quitting work over the last year, citing mental health as a key reason to go unemployed.

A few days ago I posted on this community a link to this opinion piece. That article says: "failing to redress the issues facing young men will push them further towards the far right".

The article I'm now posting features two letters in response to that story. One letter seemingly disagrees with some of the points of the original article. But the other letter agrees with the original article.

Thoughts on this? Do you think young men in Britain are finding it harder to cope with society's expectations these days?

cross-posted from: https://slrpnk.net/post/19515148

Archived version

The Chinese fast-fashion brand Shein has spent more than a year working on a plan to list its shares on the London Stock Exchange, and successive British governments have tried to help.

[...]

Yet this business deal could have huge ramifications that stretch far beyond the Square Mile.

That’s not just because of the many accusations that have dogged Shein for years – including forced labour in its supply chain, environmental recklessness, and tax-loophole exploitation at the expense of traditional retailers.

[...]

Jeremy Hunt did his best to reel in Shein in his final months as chancellor last year, and his successor [Rachel Reeves] has continued those efforts. Having proclaimed that economic growth is the “number-one mission” of her Government, Reeves wants to demonstrate to China that the UK is open for its business.

[...]

Shein and claims of forced labour

[...]

An undercover investigation by Channel 4 in 2022 found that labourers making Shein’s clothes in contractors’ factories were often working up to 18 hours a day, and being paid as little as 3p per item, with no weekends and only one day off per month.

The revelations led some influencers to refuse any further work with Shein, and the Rolling Stones cancelled a licensing deal with the brand after The i Paper alerted them to the scandal.

The company vowed to invest millions to improve standards after confirming that some suppliers were abusing workers. But last year another investigation by the Swiss campaign group PublicEye concluded that “illegal working hours” were still common for many workers in Guangzhou. Shein said it takes “firm action” if suppliers break local laws.

Just last week it admitted that audits had uncovered two cases of child labour in supplier factories. Shein terminated contracts with the firms involved immediately, saying it would “work tirelessly to ensure that these isolated cases are removed from our supply chain entirely in future”.

The UK’s Independent Anti-Slavery Commissioner, Eleanor Lyons, warned last year: “Encouraging a company like Shein to float on the UK market inadvertently implies endorsement of poor labour practices.” Human rights campaigners fear that we could all become complicit if UK pension funds buy shares in the company.

[...]

In January, a senior Shein lawyer repeatedly refused to tell the Commons Business Committee whether its products contain cotton from Xinjiang. She also failed to answer questions about the flotation, leaving committee chairman Liam Byrne “pretty horrified by the lack of evidence” presented to MPs by the firm.

[...]

Shein has been laying the ground carefully in London. It has employed Global Counsel, the lobbying firm owned by Lord Mandelson – now British ambassador to the US – to approach ministers on its behalf. Another lobbyist – Kamella Hudson of FGS Global – accompanied Shein executive chairman Donald Tang to meetings with Labour ministers last year, just months after she assisted Reeves during last summer’s election campaign, according to Bloomberg.

However, revelations about this private courtship have increased the sense of alarm among Labour backbenchers. They have joined the likes of former Tory leader Iain Duncan Smith and ex-security minister Tom Tugendhat warning against the flotation, with the latter previously calling the retailer “a sinister cross between surveillance and capitalism”.

Labour MP Rachael Maskell, who served as shadow employment secretary under Jeremy Corbyn, became concerned about Shein after one of her constituents – a painter who runs a small stationary firm in York – complained it had copied one of her designs, a copyright breach costing £100,000.

[...]

Blair McDougall, the Labour MP who chairs the all-party parliamentary groups on both Hong Kong and Uyghurs, agrees. “Nobody can have any confidence that this is a company whose products are free from slave labour,” he says. “The City of London cannot be a soft touch for unethical companies.”

[...]

Asked about the Chancellor’s apparent support for a London listing, Maskell says ministers “should think again, because it will undermine businesses on all sorts of fronts”. She said it would be a step towards the UK becoming a “bargain-basement economy,” which Starmer himself warned against in 2017.

[...]

Shein hoped to go public in London by Easter, but that is expected to be postponed until the second half of the year after a troubling few months for the company.

[...]

“Investors who have a keen eye on environmental, social and governance issues will be nervous and less inclined to invest in Shein,” says Susannah Streeter [head of money and markets at investment platform Hargreaves Lansdown], calling the company a “laggard” on these issues compared to rivals.

Then again, “listing in London may force it to clean up its act,” she says. “There will be a spotlight trained on it, and Shein appears to have already taken some steps to ensure its supply chain is more transparent.”

[...]

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.sdf.org/post/31001120

Archived

On the morning of March 10, the container ship Solong collided with an American tanker in the North Sea. British police subsequently arrested the 59-year-old captain of the Solong, whose name has not yet been disclosed. However, a Reuters report indicates that the captain is a Russian citizen.

The Solong, owned by the Hamburg-based international shipping company Ernst Russ, struck the anchored U.S. tanker Stena Immaculate, which was carrying jet fuel for the U.S. military. The impact caused fires to break out on both vessels, and as of March 12, the flames had not been fully extinguished. The crews were evacuated, but one Solong crew member remains missing. The captain is suspected of involuntary manslaughter due to negligence, as the missing crew member is presumed to have died as a result of the incident.

According to AIS (Automatic Identification System) tracking data, Solong was approaching Stena Immaculate at a speed of 16 knots (approximately 30 km/h) and made no visible attempts to avoid the collision. An American sailor aboard the tanker told CBS News that the container ship appeared “out of the blue.”

Initial reports following the accident suggested that Solong was carrying 15 containers of toxic sodium cyanide. However, Ernst Russ later denied this, stating: “There are four empty containers on board that previously held hazardous chemicals,” according to a statement obtained by The Insider.

[...]

Failing to redress the issues facing young men will push them further towards the far right

in several areas there is now a reverse gender gap, with boys, particularly those from poorer backgrounds, struggling to keep up with girls

Do you think this is an important issue?