I DOUBT any of us did not shed tears of joy when the Chilean miners were rescued, for their incarceration deep in the bowels of the earth was the hell of our worst nightmares. The only positive outcome from the disaster is the pledge by the Chilean President that he will reform safety standards in the mines, for we know now that if the safety ladder had been finished, rather than stopping a third of the way up they would never have had to endure that fight for their lives.
As I looked at the band of gold on my third finger it was a reminder that terrible working conditions to extract minerals simply for me to wear are not just tales from the ‘bad old days’, but with us still. I remembered the shocking line drawings in our school history books of the inhumane conditions of the Industrial Revolution, where children as young as five would crawl and drag carts through the tiniest coal seams in the pitch black, working 16 hour days with a life expectancy of 25. It didn’t seem so far removed from the scenes this week.
For, the fact is we should have long ago replaced outdated mining techniques for fuel and minerals. The NGO ‘Impulse’ estimates 70,000 small girls and boys work in the coal ‘ratmines’ on the border between Bangladesh and Nepal, the children are bought for between 50 to 75 US dollars. They are then forced to work long hours in the horrendous conditions of the coal mine for free repaying the debt they owe. They are not an isolated case.
From ruby mining in Burma, to cocoa plantations in Cote d’Ivoire, from sugar cane in Brazil to firework factories in China, documented evidence gathered this year shows how bonded labour and child exploitation infiltrate every aspect of our lives.In some cases, such as Brazil, the government is cracking down in other countries labour laws are deliberately ignored to maximise profit and competition. But globalisation means even companies such as Apple, who promote excellent working conditions, have discovered child labour used in the production of their computers.
It was ironic as Delhi struggled to host the Commonwealth Games safely and pictures were broadcast across the globe of workers, some of which were children, squatting breaking rubble, that Team England had chosen Jerusalem as its national anthem. For Blake’s vision of a time when ‘dark satanic mills’ would be replaced with ‘ a green and pleasant land’ has indeed come to pass for many us, but sadly not for those workers who supply our shops with the cheap goods we take for granted.
The horrors of the Industrial Revolution are flourishing still, and it shames me that I am so easily able to enjoy the products that fillour shelves without questioning the process that put them there. Next time the Last night of the Proms audience belts out “I will not cease from mental fight”, I’ll remember the miners…
