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Charles Kernaghan executive director of the National Labor Committee, discusses recent scandals linking children’s products to sweatshop labor. National Labor Committee recently found forced labor of up to 90 hours a week and pay as low as 46 cents an hour in Chinese factories linked to Mateel. The clothing company the Gap has announced its cut ties with a subcontractor found to be holding children in slave-like conditions in India to make clothing sold by Gap Kids. The London Observer revealed Sunday that children as young as ten years old have been subjected to work long hours without pay and regular threats and beatings. Gap began auditing its labor conditions in 2004, years after reports of abusive conditions at its factories first emerged.

The Gap expose is only the latest scandal linking children’s products to sweatshop labor. Earlier this year the toy giant Mattel recalled some 21 million China-made toys found to contain lead paint easily swallowed by children. Last week the National Labor Committee in Support of Human and Worker Rights released three reports documenting the conditions for workers making those toys. The reports found forced labor of up to 90 hours a week and pay as low as 46 cents an hour. Aside from Mattel, other companies using the factories include Wal-Mart, McDonalds and the swimwear manufacturer Speedo.

Charles Kernaghan is the executive director of the National Labor Committee, widely considered this country’s leading voice in exposing the foreign labor abuses of major U.S. corporations. He joins me in the firehouse studio.

* Charles Kernaghan, Executive Director of the National Labor Committee.

Duration : 0:6:58

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See the full article on Etsy’s blog, the Storque. Toymaker Amber Dusick aka woodmouse has her wood shop in her garage in downtown LA. After the birth of her son, this one time farm girl from Minnesota became nostalgic for the toys from her past: simple, natural toys that would inspire creativity and imaginative play, made from materials that wouldn’t stick around in a landfill for thousands of years.

This video can also be seen at etsy.com and etsy.com’s YouTube channel- YouTube/etsy

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Duration : 0:5:33

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Goodwill is gleaning through children’s items that they will allow to be sold in their stores per new regulations now in place with the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act which went into affect February 10, 2009. A rep with a large notebook explained that Goodwill has always been proactive in pulling recalled childrens’ items. At least this thrift store chain appears to be using some commons sense and at least in Omaha, Nebraska, isn’t making it policy to not sell anything for children!

Video from KPTM Fox42 Omaha, Nebraska
Broadcast Monday, February 9, 2009
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Please go to the KPTM Fox42 website to comment-

http://www.kptm.com/Global/story.asp?s=9816275

Duration : 0:2:32

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Angela Suleman says her daughter Nadya is incapable of taking care of 14 kids. [FEB 09 2009] GOOD MORNING AMERICA.

CLICK TO VIEW NADYA’S NEW OCTUPLET WEBSITE: http://www.thenadyasulemanfamily.com/
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LOS ANGELES (AP) – The mother of the woman who used a fertility doctor to give birth to octuplets, despite already having six young children, called her daughter’s actions “unconscionable” in a videotaped interview.

Angela Suleman is caring for the six older children while her daughter is hospitalized after giving birth January 26 to the octuplets.

“She already has six beautiful children, why would she do this?” Angela Suleman said. “I’m struggling to look after her six. We had to put in bunk beds, feed them in shifts and there’s children’s clothing piled all over the house.”

[FEB 09 2009]

CONTINUE STORY: http://abcnews.go.com/Health/wireStory?id=6835472
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LOS ANGELES (AP) – The Southern California mother of octuplets receives $490 a month in food stamps and three of her first six children are disabled and receiving federal istance, her publicist confirmed Monday evening.

Spokesman Michael Furtney said Suleman did not want to disclose the nature of the disabilities, or the type or sum of the payments.

Furtney confirmed the public istance payments after two sources told The Los Angeles Times that Suleman was receiving food stamps and federal supplemental security income.

“In her view these are just payments made for people with legitimate needs and are not, in her view, welfare,” Furtney said. “She just believes that there are programs for people with needs and she and her children qualify for some of them.”

In an interview that aired Monday, Suleman told NBC “Today” show anchor Ann Curry that she does not receive welfare.

Her six other children are under the age of 7. All 14 children were the result of in-vitro fertilization. [FEB 09 2009]
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Duration : 0:3:36

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Tiffany Bjorlie who owns Lundeby’s Ecobaby knows all too well how the CPSIA is affecting what items she carries in her Tulsa shop. She explains how Selecta has pulled their eco-friendly toys from the US market. And toys are not the only items that could run scarce. That sweet handmade dress for your little princess or 100% organic cotton onesie for your bouncing baby boy may be on the “extinct” handmade list as well due to stringent testing that will go into force per the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act on February 10, 2009. AND HANDMADE BABY BOOTIES if not TESTED will be ILLEGAL!

Video from KOTV NewsOn6.com Tulsa, Oklahoma
Broadcast Tuesday, December 23, 2008
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Please go to the KOTV (CBS) NewsOn6.com website to comment-

http://www.newson6.com/Global/story.asp?S=9583225&nav=menu682_2

Duration : 0:2:27

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