By: Pat Daley

  Ethical business is all the rage - at least in the eyes of consumers.
  But, according to a survey on business ethics released last week, Canadian corporations are falling short of public expectations.
  KPMG, a multinational firm that provides accounting, tax, and consulting services to businesses, sent questionnaires to the chief executive officers of 1,000 Canadian companies. The responses showed that:

• 39% provide ethics training but almost one-third of those provide less than one hour of training per year for managers
• 58% do not have designated senior managers responsible for ethical issues
• of those that do, most of the managers spend less than 10% of their time yearly on ethical issues

  Of 48 companies that have operations outside of Canada and the United States. 14.6% have formal policies related to the use of child labour by their suppliers and 16.7% have formal policies on child labour in their own organizations.
  None of this will surprise the people involved in the Canadian Ethical Trading Action Group (ETAG). It's a coalition involving the Canadian Labour Congress, Union of Needletrades, Industrial and Textile Employees (UNITE), the Steelworkers' Humanity Fund, the Ecumenical Coalition for Economic Justice, Canadian Council for International Cooperation, and the Maquila Solidarity Network (MSN).
  This group ran a campaign just over a year ago to stop the sweatshops that produce a lot of the clothing and shoes we all wear. It received enough public support and participation that, last spring, the federal government formed the Canadian Partnership for Ethical Trading. It includes many of the members of ETAG plus:

• the Labour Behind the Label Coalition
• the Social Affairs Office of the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops
• the Hudson Bay Company
• Sears Canada
• Arrow Shirts
• Grand National Apparel Company
• the Apparel Manufacturers Association
• the Retail Council
• the Shoe Manufacturers Association
• the Alliance of Manufacturers and Exporters

  They formed a work group that has been trying to develop a Canadian Base Code of Labour Practice. Companies would sign on to the code so consumers can know if the goods they're buying were made under decent working conditions.
  It's been a long and difficult process that's far from over, according to Jonathan Eaton of UNITE. The main sticking points are issues like freedom of association - the right to form a union - and a living wage.
  But at least it's happening. Public support got it started and public support will move it along. You can see the proposed Code that's been put forward by ETAG at www.web.net/~msn. That site also has addresses for the big companies like Hudson Bay and Sears that could be encouraged to act as corporate leaders in the process.
  As Diane Girard, Senior Manager, Ethics & Integrity Services at KPMG said, "Now that the Y2K is a thing of the past, maybe organizations will start devoting more efforts to other strategic issues, such as ethics."

Pat Daley is a freelance writer and editor in Athlone in Simcoe County, Ontario.