A Chinese labor watchdog group based in the United States has published a new report alleging serious violations by Pegatron Group, a Shanghai-based factory that contracts with Apple and two other subsidiaries, Riteng and AVY. Combined, the three factories employ over 70,000 people. (Pegatron, which also works with Dell, HP, and Microsoft, is not as well-known as a much larger Apple contractor, Foxconn.)

China Labor Watch (CLW) accuses Pegatron of numerous ethical and legal violations, including “dispatch labor abuse, hiring discrimination, women’s rights violations, underage labor, contract violations, insufficient worker training, excessive working hours, insufficient wages, poor working conditions, poor living conditions, difficulty in taking leave, labor health and safety concerns, ineffective grievance channels, abuse by management, and environmental pollution.”

Pegatron and its subsidiaries, according to CLW, make "the iPhone for Apple and [are] currently manufacturing the soon-to-be-released cheap iPhone." CLW added that "due to the influx of new iPhone orders and an increased need for workers, the company recruited between 1,000 and 1,500 new workers each day in June. Pegatron’s workforce is expected to exceed 100,000 during the second half of the year."

The 62-page report (PDF) details a pretty grim picture for Pegatron factory workers. The report states:

None of the Pegatron factories in our investigations had effective grievance channels. Even when some sort of system was in place, relevant information was hurriedly passed by in new worker training. At AVY, when asked about the factory’s grievance channels, a team leader responded that there are no channels or mechanisms for workers to use. After cutting his finger on a work piece, our investigator asked his supervisor for leave so that he could get it treated, but the supervisor made the investigator wrap his finger in industrial-grade plastic tape and continue working.

The end of the report also details a first-person account of a day in the life of one worker. The unnamed worker writes:

At 10:30 a.m., I told my team leader that I wanted to go to the restroom and got his approval. I felt lucky about this after my experience yesterday in which I had been yelled at by the team leader when I asked to go to the restroom. He said, “No one else wants to go. Only you are such a pain!” Since workers in my department must always sit while working, this five-minute break is precious. A worker can stretch for a minute and have some water, since they are not allowed to bring water to their work post. One worker can apply to go to the restroom once or twice per day, but whether or not they get approval depends almost entirely on their team leader’s arbitrary judgment. And not every team leader is agreeable. According to factory regulations, except for the two meal breaks, one at noon and one in the evening, there are no mandatory breaks for workers to go to the restroom or have water.

Apple has responded to these allegations in a statement provided to Ars.