Apple’s annual audit find some violations from suppliers
Apple has identified 17 “core” violations in an audit of suppliers that scrutinized 102 of the facilities where iPods, iPhones and Mac computers are produced.
Apple said its annual supplier responsibility assessment uncovered eight violations involving “excessive recruitment fees,” three with underage workers, three relating to hazardous waste disposal by noncertified vendors, and three of “falsified records.”
For example, it said three facilities were found to have hired 15-year-old workers in countries where the minimum employment age is 16.
In addition, the company found foreign workers in eight facilities had been overcharged for agency recruitment fees, and said it required the supplier in each case to reimburse any fees over the legal limit. Apple said workers have been reimbursed $2.2 million in recruitment fee overcharges over the past two years.
Although it doesn’t identify which suppliers were responsible for the major violations or where they occurred, in its report Apple said such actions land a facility on probation, usually for a year, and management is is required to “remedy the situation immediately and implement management systems that ensure sustained compliance.”
Apple, a famously secretive company, has come under some criticism over the years for the labor practices of its suppliers, particularly in China.
Apple said its 2009 audit included all final assembly manufacturers, first-time audits of component and non-production suppliers, and 15 repeat audits of plants where a core violation had been previously discovered.
Look who’s advertising in Sun Valley
The Screen Actors Guild ran an ad in the local paper on Wednesday seeking better labor terms. We’re not talking about the L.A. Times here, but rather the Idaho Mountain Express, straight out of Sun Valley, Idaho, where Hollywood’s elite are bumping shoulders at the annual Allen & Co conference.
SAG was dealt a blow late Tuesday when another smaller Hollywood union ratified a new prime-time TV contract. SAG’s contract talks stalemated last week over some of the same issues that led to a 14-week screenwriters’ strike that paralyzed Hollywood and centered on disagreements over how union talent should be paid for work created for the Internet.
The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists won final approval despite an unusual all-out campaign by SAG to vote down the AFTRA accord. A “no” vote would have given SAG more leverage to negotiate a more favorable settlement with studios.
So why the ad in Idaho? Here’s what Screen Actors Guild National President and National Negotiating Committee Chair Alan Rosenberg said in a release:
This media conference is the place where significant deals get made. We wanted to remind the entertainment media leaders in attendance that there is another important deal to be made. Actors are the creative heart of the entertainment business, and our Screen Actors Guild members want to partner with our industry to invest in and share the rewards of our mutual digital future. Let’s keep talking and let’s make a fair deal.
Dear everyone in Hollywood,
Leave Idaho alone. It is one of the last places in America that hasn’t been corrupted by you. Nobody cares bout the actors in Hollywood, only themselves. Maybe if they made quality movies people would care. Take a hike.
The clock is ticking in Hollywood
The countdown is underway in Hollywood, with just hours to go before the contract covering 120,000 members of the Screen Actors Guild expires. What happens next is anybody’s guess, though it would be some time before actors walked off the job.
Indeed, SAG president Alan Rosenberg said in a statement that it had “taken no steps to initiate a strike authorization vote” and that any speculation was “simply a distraction.”
The Hollywood Reporter writes that several options are left for the guild and the studios. “They could negotiate a contract extension, which could be by day, week or month, and keep talking; the studios could lock out the actors; or SAG could seek a strike-authorization vote from its membership, which will be at least a two-week process as the negotiating committee must vote on whether to bring a strike.”
SAG’s contract talks have bogged down on some of the same issues that prompted the strike by screenwriters, who walked off the job late last year and stayed away for months.
In the meantime, most film production has already shut down since the studios don’t want the risk of their projects being interrupted by a strike, Variety reports. It said that “TV production has also ratcheted down but not stopped completely.”
This all sounds very, very familiar.
Actors need their pay the industry is changing everyone is felling something some the pain of runaway production some the squabble over writers and actors pay. The bottom line. It’s a new world. the old world had standards so does the new one. Everyone should get payed accordingly. No one can replace Hollywood or Southern California for it weather they can run but they’ll run back. The standard for film making is dictated by the number of shoot days one can complete. we need to build more studios with back lost and standing sets that are affordable and with in a day’s drive of Hollywood in-order to promote more films being mad here in California. Let the studios make their money then pay everyone accordingly. Let the runners run they’ll be back.
Russell Michael
California City Studios Inc.
