Louisiana Walmart Supplier Ordered to Pay $248,000 in Safety Fines and Back Wages

Posted on July 25, 2012 by jway

The Labor Department announced on Tuesday that it ordered Walmart Supplier CJ’s Seafood to pay almost $250,000 in fines and unpaid wages. CJ’s is a Breaux Bridge, Louisiana-based seafood processing plant and in June it was estimated that 85% of the company’s crawfish was sold to Walmart.

Forty guest workers at CJ’s, who came to the US on temporary work visas, went on strike on June 4 to protest abusive working conditions. The workers allege that CJ’s subjected them to forced, unpaid overtime, sometimes for shifts up to 24-hours long, along with threats of violence against the workers and their families to force them to work faster and to prevent them from contacting law enforcement.

On June 6, the workers submitted complaints related to forced labor, stolen wages, unfair labor practices and discrimination to the Department of Labor and the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Tuesday’s announcement by the Department of Labor (DOL) marks the completion of two separate DOL investigations, led by DOL Wage & Hour Division and by the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

The $248,000 in fines and back wages announced on Tuesday includes:

 

The temporary guest worker, H2-B visa program, affords employers the opportunity to temporarily hire guest workers on short-term work visas. Employers using the program are required to pay wages that are equal to or higher than the highest prevailing wage or the applicable minimum wage. According to DOL’s Wage & Hour Division Deputy Administrator Nancy Leppink, “this employer took illegal advantage of the H-2B program, which put it in a position to undercut its competition that plays by the rules.”

The DOL also reports that CJ’s has refused to pay all the back wages, damages, and penalties that the Wage & Hour division has found due, which is clearly not in keeping with Walmart’s requirement that its suppliers follow all applicable labor, immigration, and health and safety violations.

The CJ’s saga shines a spotlight on Walmart’s lack of honesty about conditions in its supply chain. Back in June, Walmart announced results of an internal review of working conditions at CJ’s. Walmart said it was “unable to substantiate claims of forced labor or human trafficking.” Not until June 29, facing pressure from striking workers, the National Guestworker Alliance (NGA), the Worker Rights Consortium and others did Walmart finally suspend its contract with CJ’s. NGA found that although Walmart has labor policies in place that it asks suppliers to follow, CJ’s Seafood had violated seven of these eleven standards without the Walmart taking notice.

This post was written by Rebecca Cassler.

Comments

  • Gail Gardner

    More Americans need to realize that the H1B and H2B Visa programs are how businesses CLAIM they pay imported workers the same as Americans but in fact work them 2-3 times harder and can do almost anything to them because if they complain they can be deported or worse. 

    Wal-Mart’s business practices pressure their suppliers to mistreat workers as they apply continual pressure on them to reduce prices. This is ridiculous and leads to products that break the day you buy them.  

    One product that others bought at Wal-Mart broke THREE TIMES. It APPEARS TO BE identical to something I bought at a dollar store but that one did not break. The logical cause would be that the supplier has changed the way that product is made to reduce the cost.  

    I encourage everyone to STOP buying from Wal-Mart and support their local small businesses. Encourage them to SOURCE LOCALLY as that is the solution to economic collapse.