Edinburgh Woollen Mill mulls legal action over unpaid Bangladesh bill claims

By

Sandra Halliday

Published
Oct 6, 2020

Edinburgh Woollen Mill is considering legal action against the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) over claims that it owes millions of pounds in unpaid bills to manufacturers in the country.

The company said that no money is owed and that the £26.7 million recently quoted in the media is “an old figure that is completely baseless and without any merit”. 

It also said in a letter from EWM Chairman John Herring that the claims could jeopardise “the future of the business, its credit lines, and its 24,000 employees”. Herring said that the lack of clarification around the claims put the firm’s “critical relationships with credit insurers” at risk.

The company said that new suppliers “have been having difficulty accessing credit coverage for future orders over the last few days on the back of these allegations”.

The letter was sent to the President of the BGMEA “urging it to rapidly correct falsehoods about outstanding debts to BGMEA members”.

An EWM spokesperson also said: “To the best of our knowledge, all outstanding amounts that were owed to suppliers in Bangladesh have been settled or agreed. Old figures that have been recirculated are completely baseless and without any merit. They are categorically false, and risk putting our business in serious jeopardy.”

The company added that since the letter, a number of suppliers that are members of the BGMEA have written to EWM, saying that “any damage done to EWM Group… would be catastrophic both for us and the Bangladesh RMG industry as a whole”.