Sweatshops Thrive As Economic Downturn Bites

Jeff Nicols writes

Buyers are turning their backs on ethical choices as the pennywise consumers go in search of bargains, experts said today.

“We are seeing an increasing amount of people who are standing up for their right to a good deal,” said out-of-work banker Bridagier Sir Rupert Something-Posh.

“Not everyone has a £700,000 pension to fall back on these day,” he added, “and for a lot of people, it’s ‘ethics smethics’. “

The change of heart contrasts with the period leading up to 2008, and the relative prosperity afforded to consumers willing to pay more for ethically-sourced clothing and organically-grown food.

Farmers will soon have the freedom to return to practices such as injecting chickens with beef hormones and more traditional methods of raping the earth for short-term profits.

Grateful

The news will be especially welcome in developing countries by employees who are all too willing to accept low wages and inhumane working conditions.

Waitrose is introducing a “sweatshop range” to give customers the choice of buying the same products cheaper.

A spokesman said: “In many cases the produce is fresher than our regular produce, because kids can get into places where adults can’t fit - when picking fruit for example.”

Barack Obama honoured the occasion with a press conference in the Rose Garden of the White House where he doused the flowers with a manufactured chemical fertiliser for the first time since the Bush administration, which favoured organic gardening.

Obama, America’s first openly black president, said: “It’s cheaper and it creates jobs. There’ll be no bullshit in this government.”