Primark urged to compensate building collapse victims

PROTESTERS targeted Prim­ark’s flagship store yesterday to demand compensation 
for workers killed when a factory complex collapsed in Bangladesh.

More than 300 people died and thousands had to be
rescued when the eight-storey building crumbled in the
capital Dhaka on Wednesday. Four men were arrested yesterday over the tragedy, including two building owners, and two engineers involved in designing the complex.

The high street giant occupied a floor of the building and workers were suppliers to the brand. A petition is calling for Primark and other retail brands that used the building to compensate the families of workers killed or injured.

Speaking outside Primark’s Oxford Street store in London, Murray Worthy, from campaign group War on Want, said: “The 300 deaths in the Bangladesh building collapse were not an accident – they were entirely preventable deaths. If Primark had taken its responsibility to those workers seriously, no-one need have died this week.”

Worthy said there were reports of garment factory workers being told to return to work despite cracks being found in the building on Tuesday.

Campaigners also want Primark, along with Matalan and Mango which also used the building, to sign the Bangladesh Fire and Building Safety Agreement to end the “appallingly unsafe factory conditions”.