Child labour persists at PostNL in Belgium, Minister of Post wants taskforce
There are still children working at PostNL in Belgium, according to new research by VTM Nieuws, Het Laatste Nieuws and the union BTB-ABVV. Four months after a first undercover report, PostNL Belgium has still not managed to tackle child labour at its subcontractors, according to local media. They were able to film a 13-year-old boy who, according to them, works for the postal company two to three days a week for 5 euros an hour.
The journalists also caught a subcontractor red-handed, who appeared to employ several children who were being pressured to lie. According to a former subcontractor, PostNL knows about everything. "But they don't care, as long as the parcels are delivered."
The courier company denies this. "These are serious allegations that we have not identified ourselves during our daily checks and extensive investigations." The company therefore refers to the courts. "We constantly share the results of our own checks with the social inspectorate," they state. "We work according to the rules and stand for good and social working conditions for everyone who works at or for us."
"As long as PostNL, the other parcel companies and by extension the entire transport sector, do not realise that something is thoroughly wrong with the business model they operate, exploitation, social dumping and fraud will remain rampant," says Frank Moreels of Belgian labour union BTB-ABVV.
"It's time that large companies realise that honest transport is only possible at a fair price. It's time that PostNL and the other transport companies also dare to state this publicly."
Large companies continue to push down prices without asking why a particular company can offer cheap transport. PostNL and the other transport companies that go along with this at the expense of their subcontractors and drivers have an equally large responsibility, says Moreels. "It is time to break the downward spiral and set things straight."
In a reaction, Belgian Minister of Post Petra De Sutter (Groen, Flemish green party) said that she wants to set up a task force to prevent any more minors being employed in the parcel sector in Belgium. "I want to be careful and I don't know if it is a widespread problem, but if these images really show what I saw then we have to tackle this with several ministers", she says. The Belgian Ministers for Employment and Mobility could, for example, "call the transport federations to account", says De Sutter. "I am going to ask him to investigate how the bad apples can be removed from the transport sector."
The sector should also help think about solutions. "This 'race to the bottom', for which children are now also paying the price, must stop immediately." She suggests, for example, that customers should be given more insight into the various delivery options when they purchase something online. "Free delivery is a fairy tale. There is always someone who pays the price," she notes. The workload can also be reduced by steering customers more towards pick-up points and providing legislative rules for parcel letterboxes.
The Minister says she has a draft bill ready that will stand up for the parcel deliverer. "They are now being hounded all day long, work under heavy stress and often do not have a leg to stand on. By obliging the biggest parcel companies to work with more permanent contracts, these abuses will stop."
(KOR)
Picture © BELGA PHOTO PHILIPPE FRANCOIS