Why I'm Accredited by Ethical Clothing Australia

You may have noticed the Ethical Clothing Australia tags and logos on my products, and seen me sharing and referencing them on socials and in my emails. If you aren't terribly familiar with Ethical Clothing Australia, I'd like to introduce you.

I've been accredited by Ethical Clothing Australia since September 2023, and I'm proud to have recently been re-accredited.

Ethical Clothing Australia Week runs from 10 to 20 September this year, and I'll be participating as a speaker in The Considered Wardrobe: A Practical Styling Session, a free webinar on 14 September alongside my good friend Meg from megsmithmakes and the team from Bamboo Body.

We'll be talking through practical styling, working with colour, and how to build a wardrobe that actually fits your life, whether that's a small, tightly curated collection or a larger one built from bolder, more varied pieces you can style many different ways. We'll also share what accreditation means to each of us, go deeper into our individual designs, and answer your questions live, on quality, on what a sale actually means for a small brand, and on why a transparent, ethical supply chain matters so much to us. You can book a free spot here.

What is Ethical Clothing Australia?

Ethical Clothing Australia is an Australian not-for-profit working towards fair, safe and equal work for everyone in the textile, clothing and footwear supply chain. I say working towards deliberately, because we're a long way from that being the reality yet. They're also working hard to bring awareness to modern slavery here in Australia, and towards eliminating it. It's not just a problem in other countries. It's one here too.

How much are Australian garment workers actually paid?

An outworker interviewed by ABC News said she'd walk past shops selling garments she'd made for $500 to $1,000, while being paid around $10 an hour herself. Australia's casual minimum wage is $33.05 an hour. Would you work for $10 an hour? Would your local GP see you for $10?

This kind of exploitation overwhelmingly targets women, often women newly arrived in Australia, with the abuse frequently starting around the same time they arrive. They're taken advantage of in their need, and too scared to stand up for their rights. There's piecework and outworkers, many not paid a living wage, expected to work extremely long hours. They suffer, and their families suffer with them, children watching a parent work terribly hard and still not have enough to pay the bills. This exploitation is easier when someone's grasp of language isn't the greatest, and they have no idea what their rights are in a new country.

These aren't abstract numbers either. Ethical Clothing Australia and the Textile, Clothing and Footwear Union have documented real outworkers' own accounts. Kim, a home-based machinist, had never worked within an Ethical Clothing Australia supply chain until she landed a job with an accredited business, before that she described working until 2am some nights with no formal agreement in place. Now she has part-time hours, secure pay, and proper entitlements. As she told Ethical Clothing Australia, "it's not about the money, it's about whether my work looks good." Anh, another outworker, spoke about how isolating the work can be, with no one around to talk to, until she was connected with the union and finally had someone to turn to when something went wrong. These are Australian women, in Australian homes, making clothes for Australian brands.

I recently came across a raw, unscripted video on social media of a woman describing her parents' exploitation, told through the eyes of the child who watched it happen. It stopped me in my tracks, heartbreaking, and frustrating knowing how little I can personally do to change it. I think that's part of why I'm accredited by Ethical Clothing Australia. This is my voice, me standing up for what I believe in, and standing by it. I wish more small businesses, and even the big ones, would make that same commitment and stand by us.

Why this needs to be everyone's problem

That's 120 businesses in the whole of Australia who've stood up to be counted as a business that cares and wants the right thing done. Personally, I find that hard to fathom. No one should be making money from someone else's misfortune or ill treatment. Government needs to do more, and every business in Australia should be audited and held accountable for how they treat the people who make their products.

It's not just small, emerging brands like mine either. Cue Clothing was accredited from 2008, one of the biggest names to carry the accreditation, until it ceased in December 2023. Commitment like this can slip, even from businesses with the resources to maintain it.

Why isn't ethical accreditation mandatory in Australia?

That's exactly the question my friend Kate, who runs Magenta Threads and is accredited herself, keeps asking, one I keep asking too, along with our fellow Ethical Clothing Australia community. I hold exactly the same view. I'm honestly at a loss as to what government is actually doing about this, because from where I stand, it's very little. It's part of why I want to start speaking more directly with politicians and people in a position to actually change this, not just write about it.

I've met Kate, along with Lisa from Spiritus Eco Clothing and Meg from megsmithmakes, and Sally from Empowered Clothing, through Ethical Clothing Australia accreditation and the events it runs. Meg, Lisa and I are close by in the Dandenong Ranges, Kate and Sally are a bit further out but no less part of the same community. That connection has honestly become one of the most valuable parts of being accredited, a genuine support network I didn't expect to find, built entirely because we each chose to be accountable in the same way.

The work Ethical Clothing Australia is doing beyond accreditation

Alongside auditing supply chains, Ethical Clothing Australia is working to shine a real light on garment workers themselves, running outreach programs that create a genuinely safe space for outworkers to be seen, heard, and supported, often for the first time. That work matters just as much as the accreditation itself.

If any of this has struck a chord, I'd love for you to join Meg, Bamboo Body and me at The Considered Wardrobe on 14 September, it's free. And more than that, I'd love for you to think about supporting ethically produced, accredited clothing wherever you can, whether that's with me or with any of the 120 businesses standing up to be counted. If you know someone, a friend, a family member, anyone in your community, who'd want to know this too, I'd be so grateful if you shared this with them.

You can find out more, or explore accredited brands yourself, on Ethical Clothing Australia's website, or see my own accreditation listing here.

When is Ethical Clothing Australia Week 2026? It runs from 10 to 20 September, and my session is just one small part of a full program worth exploring.