Allegations of Chinese prison labour in Regatta’s supply chain

  • ETI
  • 1 December 2023
Hands feed fabric through a sewing machine. Photo credit: Shutterstock.

Regatta alerted us to the situation of alleged prison labour at a factory producing for them in China, which has since been covered in The Guardian.

The company has been an active ETI company member since 2012 and fully understands their responsibilities with respect to workers in their supply chain. They have undertaken the steps we would expect to gather evidence and conduct a thorough investigation of this allegation.  

We expect all ETI company members to map their supply chains and conduct human rights due diligence on salient risks - for China, forced labour is a significant one. Despite this, we make clear that even enhanced human rights due diligence faces significant limitations in the country, and it remains difficult to guarantee the absence of Uyghur exploitation and state-imposed forced labour from supply chains based there. Similarly, audits in China are very unlikely to pick up these issues and can put auditor and company staff at serious risk in attempts to expose them.  

ETI Executive Director, Peter McAllister stated: 

"We know that Regatta takes this allegation seriously and we will work with them to ensure their investigation of this situation establishes a clear picture of conditions at the factory and that any necessary mitigating and or remedial human rights actions are taken. "

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