Recruiters say their workers 'not mistreated' in Sports Direct enquiry

Senior executives at labour providers Transline and The Best Connection (TBC) have told MPs agency workers they supply to sportswear retailer Sports Direct have not been mistreated.
Wed, 8 Jun 2016

Senior executives at labour providers Transline and The Best Connection (TBC) have told MPs agency workers they supply to sportswear retailer Sports Direct have not been mistreated.

Transline chief executive Chris Kirkby and finance director Jennifer Hardy, and TBC CEO Andy Sweeney, appeared before Parliament's Business, Innovation & Skills Committee meeting yesterday on working practices at Sports Direct.

The committee heard evidence from union Unite representatives Steve Turner and Luke Primarolo, who claimed workers at a Sports Direct distribution site in Shirebrook, Derbyshire were so scared of losing their jobs they are coming to work heavily pregnant and unwell.

Referring to a company six strikes policy, Primarolo told the committee: “You can have a strike for excessive chatting. You can have a strike for taking a day off sick or having to stay home because your children are sick.

“When you have people under that much fear, they come into work ill, and when you get presenteeism in the workplace that represents a significant health and safety risk, because these people are not only a risk to themselves but they are a risk to those they are working with.”

Primarolo referred to a BBC Freedom of Information Request made last year to East Midlands Ambulance Service that showed the Shirebrook site had had 110 call-outs, including 34 for chest pains and five for births or miscarriages or pregnancy-related issues – one was for someone in November 2015 who had given birth in a toilet.

“You’re given a strike if you don’t attend work, and so people attend work when they shouldn’t be at work,” Turner said. “Anyone who has received six strikes within a rolling six-month period will have their assignment at Sports Direct ended. So people come to work. Pregnant women come to work and end up taken to hospital via ambulance or giving birth in a toilet.”

The recruitment agencies were asked a series of questions about Sports Direct’s strikes policy. Transline’s Kirkby told the Committee the agency had started supplying workers to Sports Direct two years ago and had taken on the strikes policy that had been previously been in place.

“That’s how we operate our business,” Kirkby said. “We don’t have our own standard strike policy.”

The trio of recruiters also confirmed to the committee that to the best of their knowledge none of the staff they supplied to Sports Direct had been mistreated by the sportswear firm.

Kirkby told MPs the firm conducts employee satisfaction surveys with the staff it supplies to Sports Direct, with Hardy claiming the last of which took place four months ago, attracting just 45 responses out of 2,000 workers with 96% of respondents saying they were satisfied. 

Addressing the strikes policy Sports Direct founder and major shareholder Mike Ashley told MPs the policy the firm has been operating was if workers were a minute late, they were docked 15 minutes’ pay. He added he thought this strike was unacceptable, claiming that as far as he understands, this policy has been changed.

Ashley also admitted some of his employees may have been paid below the minimum wage last year, before security checks at the Shirebrook warehouse were streamlined.

He attributed the main problem to time-consuming security checks staff had had to go through after finishing work, admitting this had led to staff being effectively paid less than the minimum wage "at a specific time".

However, he added that this had now been addressed.

Defending the company’s use of agencies, Ashley said demand brought about by increased internet sales over the last decade had meant it would be “physically impossible” for the firm to take on workers directly. 

“The sensible thing to do is go out to professionals and say what’s your expertise? ‘You employ people – that’s what your company does for a living. You must be very good at it – so must you and so must you. Ok, let’s take those people and let’s get those people to do it.’ 

“If you were going to say to me any minute now, ‘if you were going to employ them direct Mike, you would save money’. So why wouldn’t I employ them direct? Why would I pay the middle men?”

Ashley added there is a group of people at Sports Direct who are responsible for the agencies the firm uses but said he did not know how often the agencies’ performance is reviewed.

In December last year The Guardian highlighted Transline and TBC for their relationships with Sports Direct that were said to lead to breaches of employment legislation.

The Guardianreported at the time on Sports Direct’s practices following an undercover investigation at its distribution plant in Shirebrook, Derbyshire.

Among the findings of the investigation were:

• Docked wages for those arriving late to their shift, leading to pay cheques below the minimum wage

• A 'six strikes' policy whereby anyone receiving six strikes in six months has their employment terminated. Strikes can be given for matters such as excessively long toilet breaks and using a mobile phone in the warehouse

• Daily searches by security staff to ensure no items were stolen

• A strict clothing policy, including a list of 802 banned brands.

The firm’s six strikes policy came under scrutiny in October last year from the BBC’s Inside Out programme.

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