Rumor: Volkswagen Up! city car to cost around €9000

nobody would complain about Mex if the quality were up to par, at least India has educated poor.

— commander104 (View Profile)

Posted on 7/4/2009 5:03:54 PM | | Votes: 2   

You will say anything won't you? As far as I know, nobody has accused VW of what you are claiming but the accusation has been leveled at Toyota. They have definitely been convicted in Japanese courts for working some of their employees to death. See http://www.ecocn.org/wordpress/?p=7


---

See also

http://www.reuters.com/article/pressRelease/idUS112901+18-Jun-2008+PRN20080618

for allegations of Toyota running sweatshops and holding workers against their will.

Reuters

Toyota Linked to Human Trafficking and Sweatshop Abuses
Wed Jun 18, 2008 8:00am EDT


Toyota May Be a Shade Greener Environmentally but has badly stumbled with Human Rights Abuses

NEW YORK, June 18 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Today the National Labor
Committee (NLC) is releasing a 65-page report, "The Toyota You Don't Know" documenting serious human rights violations by the Toyota Motor Company, which will disturb most Americans.

"Celebrities like Julia Roberts, Leonardo DiCaprio, Brad Pit, Bill Maher and others have led the way in turning Toyota's Prius into a symbol of concern for our environment," said Charles Kernaghan, director of the NLC, "We hope that these same celebrities will now also challenge Toyota to improve its respect for human and worker rights. As a start, Toyota should cut its ties to the Burmese dictators and end the exploitation of foreign guest workers trafficked
to Japan."

* Toyota linked to human trafficking and sweatshop abuse: Toyota's much
admired "Just in Time" auto parts supply chain is riddled with sweatshop abuse, including the trafficking of foreign guest workers, mostly from China and Vietnam to Japan, who are stripped of their passports and often forced to work--including at subcontract plants supplying Toyota--16 hours a day, seven days a week, while being paid less than half the legal minimum wage. Guest workers who complain about abusive conditions are deported.

* Prius made by low-wage temps: Fully one-third--10,000--of all Toyota
assembly line workers in Japan are low-wage temps who have few rights and earn less than 60% of what full time workers do.

* Unpaid overtime and "overworked" to death: Mr. Kenichi Uchino was just 30 years old when he died of overwork on an assembly line at Toyota's Prius plant, leaving behind his young wife and two children. Mr. Uchino routinely worked 13 to 14 hours a day, putting in 106 1/2 to 155 hours of overtime--depending on whether work taken home was counted--in the 30 days leading up to his death. Toyota claimed that he had only worked 45 hours of overtime and that the other 61 1/2 to 110 hours were "voluntary" and unpaid. His wife had to go to court -- which ruled that Mr. Uchino was overworked to death -- to win a pension for their children.

* Ties to Burmese dictators: Toyota, through the Toyota Tsusho Corporation, which is part of the Toyota Group of Companies, is involved in several joint business ventures with the ruthless military regime in Burma. The

— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 7/6/2009 1:22:04 PM | | Votes: 1   

continued)

regime in Burma. The dictators use these revenues to repress and torture the people of Burma.

* Toyota and the race to the bottom: Toyota is imposing its two-tier, low wage model at its non-union plants in the south of the United States, which will result in wages and benefits being slashed across the entire auto industry.

The National Labor Committee recently documented how the U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement descended into human trafficking with tens of thousands of foreign guest workers held under conditions of involuntary servitude.

Access report at: http://www.nlcnet.org/article.php?id=562

SOURCE National Labor Committee

— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 7/6/2009 1:23:32 PM | | Votes: 1   

continued)

regime in Burma. The dictators use these revenues to repress and torture the people of Burma.

* Toyota and the race to the bottom: Toyota is imposing its two-tier, low wage model at its non-union plants in the south of the United States, which will result in wages and benefits being slashed across the entire auto industry.

The National Labor Committee recently documented how the U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement descended into human trafficking with tens of thousands of foreign guest workers held under conditions of involuntary servitude.

Access report at: http://www.nlcnet.org/article.php?id=562

SOURCE National Labor Committee

— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 7/6/2009 1:24:38 PM | | Votes: 1   

continued)

regime in Burma. The dictators use these revenues to repress and torture the people of Burma.

* Toyota and the race to the bottom: Toyota is imposing its two-tier, low wage model at its non-union plants in the south of the United States, which will result in wages and benefits being slashed across the entire auto industry.

The National Labor Committee recently documented how the U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement descended into human trafficking with tens of thousands of foreign guest workers held under conditions of involuntary servitude.

Access report at: http://www.nlcnet.org/article.php?id=562

SOURCE National Labor Committee

— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 7/6/2009 1:26:25 PM | | Votes: 1   

continued)

regime in Burma. The dictators use these revenues to repress and torture the people of Burma.

* Toyota and the race to the bottom: Toyota is imposing its two-tier, low wage model at its non-union plants in the south of the United States, which will result in wages and benefits being slashed across the entire auto industry.

The National Labor Committee recently documented how the U.S.-Jordan Free Trade Agreement descended into human trafficking with tens of thousands of foreign guest workers held under conditions of involuntary servitude.

Access report at: http://www.nlcnet.org/article.php?id=562

SOURCE National Labor Committee

— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 7/6/2009 1:30:16 PM | | Votes: 0   

Wow, what a rant against Toyota there.

How much does the UAW pay you to spread their propaganda?

— Invisible (View Profile)

Posted on 7/6/2009 2:56:10 PM | | Votes: 1   

Oops. A bunch of duplicate posts from when the web site was acting up yesterday.

— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 7/7/2009 1:02:19 PM | | Votes: 1   

Invisible, the Japanese government took Toyota to court because they claimed that Toyota had worked some of its employees to death. This article is from the Economist magazine.

---

"On November 30th the Nagoya District Court accepted Hiroko Uchino’s claim that her husband, Kenichi, a third-generation Toyota employee, was a victim of karoshi when he died in 2002 at the age of 30. He collapsed at 4am at work, having put in more than 80 hours of overtime each month for six months before his death. 'The moment when I am happiest is when I can sleep,' Mr Uchino told his wife the week of his death. He left two children, aged one and three."


"As a manager of quality control, Mr Uchino was constantly training workers, attending meetings and writing reports when not on the production line. Toyota treated almost all that time as voluntary and unpaid. So did the Toyota Labour Standards Inspection Office, part of the labour ministry. But the court ruled that the long hours were an integral part of his job. On December 14th the government decided not to appeal against the verdict."


"Official figures say that the Japanese work about 1,780 hours a year, slightly less than Americans (1,800 hours a year), though more than Germans (1,440). But the statistics are misleading because they do not count 'free overtime'. Other tallies show that one in three men aged 30 to 40 works over 60 hours a week. Half say they get no overtime. Factory workers arrive early and stay late, without pay. Training at weekends may be uncompensated."

http://www.ecocn.org/wordpress/?p=7

— TurboSpyder (View Profile)

Posted on 7/7/2009 1:09:32 PM | | Votes: 1