Women's group responds to claims promotional T-shirts were produced with "slave" labour

A women’s rights charity has rejected claims promotional T-shirts worn by the likes of Harriet Harman and Ed Miliband to promote one of its campaigns were produced in sweatshops.

Sunday newspaper, the Mail on Sunday, claimed the Fawcett Society shirts, which carried the message “This is what a feminist looks like”, were produced in a factory in Mauritius by women earning 62p and hour and who slept on the premises 16 to a room.

Miliband, Harman and Nick Clegg were all photographed wearing one of the T-shirts last week but David Cameron reportedly refused to wear one.

At this stage, we require evidence to back up the claims being made by a journalist at the Mail on Sunday

Whistles, a clothes retailer, produced the shirts on behalf of the charity.

Eva Neitzert, chief executive of the Fawcett Society, rejected the accusations saying the charity was assured by Whistles that the T-shirts were ethically compliant.

She said that if any “concrete and verifiable evidence of mistreatment of the garment producers emerges”, the charity will ensure Whistles withdraws the range with immediate effect and they will “donate part of the profits to an ethical trading campaigning body”.

Neitzert said: “At this stage, we require evidence to back up the claims being made by a journalist at the Mail on Sunday.

“However, as a charity that campaigns on issues of women’s economic equality, we take these allegations extremely seriously and will do our utmost to investigate them.”