Karamanou (PSE).
– (EL) Mr President, the World Cup is a truly international sporting
event which arouses the interest of millions of people throughout the world.
However, in the shadow of this event, thousands of children use their valuable
time every day making the balls used in football matches. These children are
deprived of any chance to acquire a better education at school or play with
other children their own age. Child labour and the inhumane working conditions
which adults making footballs also work under are, unfortunately, still
standard practice, despite the agreements concluded by the International
Football Federation with companies which make sporting goods.
According to the report by the India
Committee of the Netherlands tellingly entitled "The Dark Side of
Football", Pakistan is the biggest producer of footballs in the world,
followed by India. In just one area of India, the Punjab, about 10 000
children aged between 6 and 12 sit stitching footballs, while about 15 000
children work in the area of Sialkot in Pakistan. These balls, which are hand
stitched by children for a few cents, are the same designer and FIFA endorsed
footballs which are sold in sports shops in the west for tens of dollars.
Despite the efforts of both international
organisations and the sports companies themselves to introduce programmes and
control systems to combat this awful practice, production has shifted to small
villages where either there is no policing or the children work at home rather
than in factories. Similarly, according to the London Times, numerous children
have been found making footballs for famous multinational companies.
We call on international organisations,
sports companies and governments to use the World Cup, which has been dedicated
to children, as an opportunity to work together and adopt a reliable system for
checking if labour regulations are being complied with. Because child labour is
neither a hobby nor a game, I hope both FIFA and the industry will take the
lead and make football a truly fair game for everyone. We need to send out a
message today that adults should be given work and children should be sent to
school. Adults at work, children in school.