Amazon shareholders vote down audit of warehouse work conditions

Amazon shareholders have voted towards a proposal calling for the e-commerce large to conduct an unbiased audit of its warehouse working conditions, regardless of ongoing concern about excessive damage and worker turnover charges.

The warehouse audit proposal – which shareholders voted on throughout Amazon’s annual common assembly (AGM) on 25 May – was submitted by digital funding platform Tulipshare in December 2021.

While Amazon maintains that it “provides a safe and positive workplace”, there have been quite a few experiences of accidents occurring in warehouses, unattainable efficiency targets and unfair remedy of staff.

The Tulipshare proposal stated: “For the year 2020, it was reported that Amazon’s injury rate was more than twice as high as that of Walmart warehouse workers, and that Amazon’s serious injury rate was nearly 80% higher than the wider warehouse industry.” It added that the corporate’s excessive worker turnover fee – about 150% a 12 months earlier than the pandemic – was virtually double that of the broader retail and logistics industries.

Amazon initially tried to have the proposal excluded from its AGM, with its legal professionals writing to US securities regulator SEC in January 2022 to request its removing on the idea that office issues of safety had been “a matter of ordinary business” and subsequently excludable.

The SEC – which changed its guidance on 3 November 2021 in order that shareholder proposals associated to “significant social policy issues” might not be excluded below the “ordinary business” exception – rejected this request, marking the primary time the difficulty of staff’ remedy and security was put to a vote at an Amazon AGM.

It is at the moment unclear which approach particular shareholders voted, as a result of the data on the total end result is just not launched till 4 days after the vote. Both Tulipshare and Amazon have confirmed that, primarily based on the preliminary outcomes, shareholders voted towards the proposal.

Computer Weekly contacted Vanguard Group and BlackRock – main Amazon shareholders which personal 6.6% and 5.4% of all excellent shares, respectively – however solely obtained a response from Vanguard, which stated it didn’t touch upon its votes or the votes of its portfolio firms as a matter of firm coverage.

“While we are disappointed that our proposal did not pass today, this vote was just the beginning in the fight for workers’ rights,” stated Antoine Argouges, CEO and founder of Tulipshare, which plans to resubmit its movement in 2023.

“Amazon has not yet disclosed the full outcome of the vote, but based on the positive conversations we have had with major shareholders this week, we have every reason to believe our proposal received strong backing. Once the results are published, we will consider our options for continuing the fight for better working conditions at Amazon.”

Tulipshare’s chief advertising and marketing officer, Jenna Armitage, beforehand instructed Computer weekly that ongoing experiences of poor working conditions at Amazon had been unhealthy for enterprise.

“The issues have gone on for too long, and it is our duty to oversee the management of Amazon as shareholders,” she stated. “It is Amazon warehouse workers’ labour that pays out the dividends to shareholders, so we have to ensure that our dividends don’t come at the cost of compromising safety for workers.”

Armitage added that the vote gave buyers an opportunity to indicate they weren’t complicit in Amazon’s remedy of warehouse staff.

Although shareholders rejected the warehouse audit and 14 further resolutions referring to staff’ rights, the corporate’s environmental impression or different social points, they did approve proposals on executive compensation and a stock split.  

A quantity of main funding establishments, together with Schroders, Glass Lewis and Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS), publicly indicated their intention to vote in favour of the proposal previous to the AGM. Computer Weekly contacted Schroders, Glass Lewis and ISS for remark however had obtained no response by time of publication.

Computer Weekly additionally contacted Amazon concerning the end result of the vote, in addition to the way it plans to enhance working conditions going ahead. Computer Weekly was referred to the Amazon proxy statement launched forward of the AGM: “Safety is integral to all the things we do at Amazon, as demonstrated by our relentless deal with well being and security coaching, engagement with workers, and refinement of our processes to enhance working conditions.

“We are clear about our dedication to, and efforts to enhance, office security, discussing our initiatives is element in our Delivered with care security report and on our web site. We have incurred greater than $15bn in Covid-19-related prices to assist preserve our workers protected and ship for our clients.

“We have disclosed our workforce incident rates, along with a comparison to a variety of industries. Our Lost Time Incident Rate was 2.3 globally and 2.6 in the US in 2020, a 43% and 49% improvement from 2019, respectively. In addition, our Recordable Incident Rate was 5.1 globally and 6.5 in the US in 2020, a 24% and 25% improvement from 2019, respectively.”

The proxy assertion added that the board, which has “direct oversight of employee wellbeing and workplace safety”, commonly opinions its security measures.

Marcus Storm, a spokesperson for the United Tech and Allied Workers (UTAW) union – a department of the UK’s Communication Workers Union (CWU) established to characterize and combat for staff’ employed inside each stage of the tech sector – stated: “Amazon has huge inquiries to reply about its remedy of hard-working warehouse workers. Comparisons with related firms comparable to Walmart are extraordinarily unfavourable to Amazon.

“That each particular person staff’ points and now shareholders’ calls for for an unbiased audit are being ignored is a critical trigger of concern to all of Amazon’s stakeholders. If an organization with the assets of Amazon is refusing an unbiased audit, it’s a huge purple flag.

“I have spoken to Amazon and ex-Amazon employees at UTAW and fully support the request for an independent audit. The board response addresses none of the questions which could be answered by a truly independent investigation.”