A labor of spin

Yesterday Chairman Serge Janssens of the European Chamber of Commerce in China called a press conference in the Kempinksi Hotel in Beijing, prior to organizing a glittering Charity Dinner where a seat at the dinner table set you back 850 to 950 yuan (92 euro or 121 dollars). Sure, proceeds will go to a good cause, but it's also another occasion for the rich to wallow in luxury. Wearers of jeans and sneakers will be stopped at the door.

The Chairman didn't show up at the press conference and no apology or explanation was offered for his absence. And so it fell to Secretary General Giorgio Magistrelli to explain to the 10-odd journalists that the chamber was fully supportive of Chinese lawmakers' efforts to draw up a new Labor Contract Law. The Chamber also advised the Chinese government to better implement its existing laws.

That's it. Finito. Spin spin spin...

The Labor Contract Law has not been finalized yet, so nobody knows what the final text will say. But some commentators had suggested that the European Chamber was not happy with the way things were turning out because better labor protection would endanger the competitiveness of companies producing in China.

Magistrelli wanted to set the record straight. European companies are supportive of the new contract law, they are not in China because of the cheap labor, but because of the market, he lectured.

Well now, that is at the very least only partially true. The Chinese government is trying to ban Dickensian child labor, infringements on work safety rules, withholding of payment of salaries and other unlawful practices. Most European companies operating in China are indeed not guilty of those practices, which may be found at some local companies or companies with Taiwanese, Hong Kong, overseas Chinese or South Korean investment.

But going so far as to say that European companies don't really care about there competitiveness in China because they are in it for the market is spin that nobody is going to believe.

Inviting foreign correspondents to a press conference to only spin the spin is disingenuous.