CAMPAIGN Sports Direct THE BRAVERY How Unite changed workers’ lives at Sports Direct


It took Sports Direct boss Mike Ashley decades to build his empire – and less than a year for it all to come tumbling down.


The sports retail giant, worth billions of pounds, had made its fortunes on the back of a low-paid, exploited workforce, one in which predominantly agency workers have lived in a culture of relentless fear.


But after Unite activists launched a co- ordinated campaign which exposed its worst practices, including paying its workers less than the minimum wage, punishing them for taking too long in the toilet or talking too much, and conducting invasive searches after the end of each shift, Sports Direct’s success was revealed to be built on a house of sand.


Shareholders revolted, the media shocked the public following a series of investigations, and Ashley was hauled before Parliament to explain himself – all thanks to Unite members working together.


In the end, Sports Direct dropped out of the FTSE 100 and its share price plum- meted from £8.20 to £2.70 in only one year.


Taking on the Goliath that is Sports Direct is no easy task – the company’s agency workers, most of whom do not speak English well, are largely unorganised and have little experience with trade unions.


Unite instead brought together several different groups – young, Community and industrial members – to organise direct actions, not only locally in Shirebrook, where Sports Direct’s central warehouse is located, but also nationally and even internationally.


“Generally each group designed and planned its own action,” explained Unite


regional officer Luke Primarolo. “What was important during the campaign was to release some control and let those groups determine their own actions.”


These direct actions ranged from leafleting outside the warehouse, organising a massive protest at Sports Direct’s AGM last year in which Unite asked investors to oust the company’s chief executive, Keith Hellawell, as well as directing 35 actions on the same day across the UK.


Community and young members staged co-ordinated protests outside dozens of Sports Direct


stores throughout


the campaign. This helped inform consumers about what was going on behind the scenes at the retailer.


The campaigners also kept up the public and media pressure for months by dropping a #SportsDirectShame banner at locations across the country, most notably at Newcastle United and Rangers games, which were viewed by millions of people on television in the UK and abroad.


Most recently, a day of action was held in Chesterfield, outside the offices of one of the agencies that employs Sports Direct staff on zero-hours contracts.


Singing a specially adapted version of Stand and Deliver, volunteers were ‘held up’ by ‘Dick Turpin’ and ‘robbed’ of their wages. Unite also set about embedding itself in the Shirebrook community, where more than 3,000 agency workers, mostly Eastern European, toil away in Sports Direct’s warehouse known locally as ‘the gulag’.


Here Unite has worked to sign Sports Direct workers up to the union, offer them English language classes, and engage with them about their struggles in and out of work.


22 uniteWORKS Summer 2016


“We’ve been working to build trust and confidence in this group of vulnerable workers,” explained Unite assistant general secretary Steve Turner.


“And that’s not only about leafleting outside the warehouse – it’s about building relationships with faith groups,


in


community centres, inside people’s front rooms where we get small groups of workers coming together discussing their issues with us to find common solutions.”


At the moment, over 150 workers are signed up to Unite’s English as a second language (ESOL) classes. They’re run entirely by Unite Community volunteers, many of whom are former and current teachers. Classes are held eight times a week, and will soon be expanded.


Unite also exposed Sports Direct’s employment practices to the media, which culminated in a series of investigations featured on the BBC, Guardian and other outlets.


Earlier this year, MPs grilled Mike Ashley at a business committee hearing at which both Turner and Primarolo presented damning evidence collected by Unite.


Turner called the hearing and a resulting report a “fantastic achievement”.


“Hundreds of thousands viewed the BIS committee hearing live,” Turner noted. “Mike Ashley admitted that they had underpaid on the minimum wage and admitted that there would have to be a sizeable back payment to many thousands of workers as a consequence of Unite’s campaign. This is Unite delivering.”


In its report, the committee praised Unite,


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36