This eight week evening course equips you with the skills you need to identify topics and research and write a range of features, including travel, food and consumer articles, profiles, reviews, news backgrounders, and opinion pieces. Classes are engaging and fun and comprise short presentations from tutors, analysis of features by well known writers, group discussion and writing practice.

Time: 7pm – 9pm

Duration: 8 weeks

Venue: London Journalism Centre, 18 Ashwin Street, Dalston, E8 3DL

Tutors: Jamie Elliott, Marcus O’Dair

Start date: Wednesday May 23

Equipment needed: Laptop computer with wireless connection

Class size: 12 maximum

Course fee: £175

For course details and to book visit London Journalism Centre

Eight weeks – Monday evenings – 7pm to 9pm

Starts: Monday, 14th May

This practical eight week evening course covers news, features, reviews and profiles, interview techniques, research methods, use of photographs, media law, investigative journalism, and how to pitch stories to editors. Limited to twelve students, classes are fast paced, interactive and fun, and include group and individual exercises which encourage you to start writing from week one.

Time: 7pm – 9pm

Duration: 8 weeks

Venue: Print House, 18 Ashwin Street, Dalston, E8 3DL

Tutors: Jamie Elliott, Marcus O’Dair, Chloe Scott, Aubrey Wade

Start date: Monday 14 May

Equipment needed: Laptop computer with wireless connection

Class size: 12 maximum

Course fee: £195

For course and tutor details and to book visit London Journalism Centre 

Opponents of a proposed large Sainsbury’s for Stoke Newington have cried foul after discovering that the public relations company hired to lobby for the scheme has also been hired by Hackney Council to design a website to promote local businesses.

They claim that the dual roles PR firm Four Communications has taken on creates a conflict of interest which means that campaigners against the supermarket development are not operating on a level playing field.

“This is an Alice in Wonderland situation where the council is spending council tax payers’ money with Four Communications, which on the one hand is supposed to be promoting local businesses and on the other is promoting a development which, if it goes ahead, is likely to damage local businesses,” says Simon De Deney, Vice Chair of Hackney Liberal Democrats.

The £14,320 contract to design a ‘Destination Hackney’ website to assist local firms involves extensive meetings with Hackney businesses, organised with help from council staff.

“The design company will be expected to meet with local businesses to understand businesses’ web needs and ideas,” the tender document describing the website contract says. “Officers have identified a range of local business associations and groups to be engaged in the design process through a programme of one-to-one forum meetings and workshops.”

London Assembly member Andrew Boff, who is also a Hackney resident, wants the council to think again. “There clearly is a conflict of interest here and a failure to tackle it would let down small businesses in the area affected,” he says.

Concerns have also been raised about the very close connections between two serving Hackney councillors and Four Communications.

Councillor Alan Laing, who until last year was the council’s Cabinet Member for Neighbourhoods and Regeneration, was taken on as a full time Account Director with the company in August 2010 and continues to work for the firm.

Announcing his appointment, Four Communications described Cllr Laing as a ‘strategic new hire’ and added: “We are keen to use Alan’s extensive network of contacts within London politics and he brings a superb track record of delivery within public affairs in both the private and public sectors”.

Cllr Karen Alcock, who until recently was Deputy Mayor, also works for Four Communications and has been employed by the company since at least 2005. As councillor for Stoke Newington’s Clissold ward, Cllr Alcock is one of the elected representatives whose constituents are most directly affected by the Sainsbury’s development plan.

A spokesman for Hackney Council said: “Cllr Laing and Cllr Alcock are both employees of Four Communications as declared on their Register of Interests, and have not been involved with this project or its procurement process as per the Council’s contractual requirements for organisations, to avoid conflict of interests.”

However, Rosanne Berry, Chair of Stoke Newington Business Association and owner of Rosa Lingerie, a shop close to the proposed new supermarket site, remains worried about the links between the PR company and the councillors.

“I am concerned that when small businesses are struggling you want your councillors to be fighting on your behalf and not to be influenced by their connections with outside companies,” she says.

Simon De Deney agrees: “Councillors Alan Laing and Karen Alcock’s employment by Four Communications only makes this cat’s cradle of interests more tangled,” he says.

Some PR companies actively avoid potential conflicts of interests when lobbying on behalf of developers. “We have a policy of not working for councils in areas where we work in other capacities,” says Andrew Howard, managing director of Hard Hat Communications, which recently represented Barratt Homes in Hackney.

In a statement, Nan Williams, Chief Executive of Four Communications said: “This project [Destination Hackney website] was won through a transparent and regulated tendering process during which we disclosed that other parts of our business, with totally separate project teams, do work in the borough on regeneration. Current projects include work for Newmark Properties in Stoke Newington.

“Similarly, we disclosed in writing that Councillor Karen Alcock and Councillor Alan Laing are both employees of Four Communications but would not be involved in any stage of the Destination Hackney project and have declared their work with Four Communications in the Members Interests and at council meetings where appropriate. We are confident that there is no conflict of interest nor the potential for one to arise in the future.”

Workers on the site were 66% more likely to be involved in a reportable accident than those working on the Olympic Park according to the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) report. The internal document also reveals that the ODA was so worried about accidents at the athletes’ village that it commissioned a special review.

“Following a number of serious incidents and near misses at the athletes’ village, a review was commissioned by the ODA Director of Construction to be conducted in mid-September by the ODA Head of Health and Safety,” the report says. ‘”it is likely that the focus on the village will continue for the foreseeable future.”

The accident frequency rate for the athletes’ village for the 12 months to September 2010 was 0.25 for every million man hours worked – or eight accidents – compared to just 0.15 or four accidents for the Olympic Park according to the report. This does not include minor accidents which are non-reportable.

However, new ODA figures leaked to the Guardian show that since September workers on the village site have been more than twice as likely to be involved in a reportable accident than their counterparts on the Olympic Park. In the final three months of 2010, the accident frequency rate at the village reached 0.24 per million man hours, more than double the Olympic Park rate of 0.11.

Accounts of accidents include one where an air ambulance was called after a worker fell through a sixth floor grating to the floor below. ‘Paramedics along with the doctors from the Air Ambulance treated the casualty,’ the report says.

Another worker was hospitalised after he ‘fell from a height’, breaking his wrist and dislocating his elbow. This incident led to an investigation by the Health and Safety Executive. One ‘fall incident’ was of such concern that the ODA issued a ‘Safety Alert’ to contractors.

UCATT, the construction workers’ union which first received the leaked report, blames weaker employment rules for the higher frequency of accidents. “The Olympic Park is governed by strict rules arranged between the Olympic Delivery Authority and the unions that ensure workers are employed directly and that minimum construction wage rates are guaranteed,” says UCATT general secretary Alan Ritchie. “The same rules do not apply to the village, creating a more casualised labour environment which impacts safety.”

UCATT points to lower wage levels as evidence of casualised working. “The latest ODA workforce survey shows that 82% of workers on the Olympic Park say they are receiving hourly pay above the London Living Wage of £7.85 per hour,” Ritchie says, “but only 60% of the workforce at the athletes’ village say they are paid above this rate. This demonstrates a clear link between casualised working practices and accidents in theconstruction industry.”

According to ODA 32% of workers at the village who took part in the survey declined to say how much they were paid, leaving 8% who said they were not receiving the London Living Wage.

Lawrence Waterman, ODA’s head of health and safety, said in a statement: “We take health and safety extremely seriously on the Olympic Park and village, which is why we have an accident frequency rate far lower than the industry average on both sites. In fact, the village’s accident frequency rate is 65% less than the industry average.

“However, we are not complacent and constantly seeking to further minimise the risk of any incidents. We do this in partnership with the contractors and this is monitored by the regulatory bodies including the Health and Safety Executive.”

The casting call, which appeared on the StarNow casting website in July, included demanding roles such as the mother of a suicide bomber. “This role requires the actor to deliver strong emotional monologues to camera but also to take part in strong scenes in which she is verbally abused by her disturbed son,” the advert said.

Employment rights campaigner Pat Dean claims actors are entitled to be paid for appearing in the film, which will be shown to hundreds of thousands of public sector workers. “The minimum wage regulations are very clear and say that all workers must be paid at least the legal minimum for every hour they work,” he says. “An individual cannot be excepted as a ‘volunteer’ if they are given set hours and duties to perform.”

A spokesman for Equity agreed. “It was a normal job of work, but only expenses were being offered,” he said. “This is illegal and at least the national minimum wage should be offered.” He added that Equity had reported the case to HM Revenue and Customs, the government department which enforces the minimum wage.

Cliff Edwards, managing director of the production company making the film, said in an email sent to Dean in July that the decision not to pay the actors was part of a cost-cutting exercise. The original casting call was for paid actors, he said, but his “Counter Terrorism and MI5 colleagues” had then insisted his company use unpaid actors in order to save money.

Edwards was unavailable for further comment. After it was contacted by the publication, ACPO said it was reconsidering its policy on paying the actors. “Filming has yet to take place and final payment for those actors involved is currently being reviewed by ACPO in conjunction with the media agency responsible for recruitment of actors to ensure that no breach of employment law has been made,” a spokeswoman said.

Fashion internships are common, but the reality is often far removed from the glamour of the catwalk. Photograph: Maya Vidon/EPA

The haute couture world may be glamorous, but some interns at the gritty end of the business are being exploited in their quest to gain industry experience, says Jamie Elliott

Some UK fashion companies are exploiting unpaid interns who sometimes work 12 hours or more a day for months on end with little prospect of a paid job afterwards. Fashion interns say they often outnumber paid staff and claim some companies rely heavily on free labour.

A few months after completing a postgraduate degree in fashion, 25-year-old Rufus Cassidy* took up an unpaid internship with top fashion house Alexander McQueen.

“Most days I worked from 8.30 in the morning until at least 2am,” he says. “We usually worked seven days a week and some of the interns got really tired because of the hours.”

Cassidy also claims the company relied on interns to carry out core work. “In the pattern making department there were 10 interns and only five paid staff. In embroidery there was just one designer and 10 interns.”

In May last year, after eight months of unpaid work, he quit. “I left because it was obvious there was virtually no chance of getting a job there,” he says. “They would have been happy for me to continue, but I just couldn’t afford to go on working for nothing. I had already done five unpaid fashion internships elsewhere.”

Employment law expert Timothy Brennan QC says companies who use interns in the way described by Cassidy could be breaking national minimum wage rules.

“The most important thing as far as the minimum wage is concerned is what the real arrangement is, not whether someone is called an intern or not,” Brennan says. “If someone is engaged on a regular basis for an extended period of time to sew sequins on to ball gowns or similar work, which is a core part of a clothing manufacturer’s operation, then that person may well be considered an employee or worker and would be entitled to the minimum wage.”

Interns at Alexander McQueen are asked to sign an agreement which includes an opt-out from working time regulations which limit the working week to 48 hours. The agreement states that this opt-out can be withdrawn by the intern at any time, on giving three months’ written notice. It also says interns “must obey all reasonable instructions that we give you and work such hours as are necessary to properly complete the tasks you are asked to undertake”.

Brennan says this agreement suggests the company’s interns are, in fact, “workers”, and therefore due the minimum wage.

“In the absence of any other material, I would be fairly confident of persuading an employment tribunal that someone who actually worked under a contract on these terms was a worker,” he says. “You don’t need to contract out of the working time regulations if you are not a worker. If you are within working time regulations because you are a worker, you are within the national minimum wage as a worker.”

In a statement, Alexander McQueen told Guardian Work it was confident that it treats its interns in compliance with all applicable laws and regulations. They said that “Alexander McQueen has had immensely positive feedback from its great many interns. Assuming that you have spoken to two or three interns, that represents a tiny minority of those who have passed through AMQ’s scheme. The critical issues that your sources have raised are completely out of line with the overwhelming majority of interns.”

The hours Cassidy was expected to work by the company may also breach other provisions of the working time regulations.

“In my view, the long hours you describe break working time regulations which say there must be at least 11 hours’ rest within any 24-hour period and that every adult worker must have a break of not less that 24 hours in each seven-day period,” says David McBride, an employment lawyer with Thompsons Solicitors.

Alexander McQueen’s lawyers told Work: “The fashion industry is by no means unique in requiring on occasions those who work in it to undertake long hours.” Prospective interns, they added, were “fully informed about the nature of the work they are asked to do,” and any intern was “well aware of the purpose of the internship and that there was no guarantee of a job at the end of it”. Those who participated gained “invaluable experience”, and enhanced their CVs and career prospects.

They also said interns were involved as closely as possible with both the culture, the working practices and the highly skilled activities of the company, that they were closely supervised and were provided with work which was “not only suitable to them, but which also will provide them with the best opportunities to learn”.

Periods of intense activity were periodic only, they insisted, such as in the run-up to collections. “The working hours of interns in the run-up to shows where our client is exhibiting collections must be seen in the context of the fact that all of our client’s staff work long hours on these occasions – which is normal in the fashion industry,” the statement said. When such hours were required, they added, interns were provided with food and taxis home and offered days off to compensate.

Alexander McQueen also denied that interns were expected to carry out core work. They described the claim that interns formed a large part of the workforce in the pattern-making and embroidery departments as “untrue and incredible” and pointed out that such assertions “betrayed a complete ignorance of Alexander McQueen’s employee structure”, which includes a substantial design team in London supplemented by several freelance technicians and about 60 employees in Italy, and a number of subcontractors who undertake creative and production tasks.

Alexander McQueen is not alone in the fashion world in attracting criticism. Former interns and staff at a number of other fashion companies claim that long hours and excessive expectations can place intense pressure on young staff.

“The designer was constantly shouting at students as young as 19, saying, ‘You’re fucking useless, you don’t know what you’re doing,’ whenever they didn’t do something properly,” says a former manager at a small but well-known fashion house which relies heavily on interns. “These girls would be working from 8am to 1am in the run-up to fashion week and some would start crying and getting hysterical because they were being expected to do a job perfectly which they’d never done before.”

Impossible expectations

For some, it gets too much. “I have seen people quit because it’s such a stressed atmosphere,” says a former intern with a larger fashion company. “If you haven’t been able to finish something on time, they keep pushing you saying, ‘The designer wants it now,’ even when you say it’s impossible.”

Former interns Work has spoken to at another company claim they were exposed to harmful chemicals. “We had to use a toxic liquid to artificially rust metal,” one says. “I got nosebleeds after using it and other students did too. At first we used this chemical in a normal room with no special ventilation, but after a week, when everyone had been getting nose bleeds, they told us to work outside on the balcony even though it was freezing cold.”

A former fashion student who was an intern with the same company, but at a different time, adds: “The liquid we had to use to age metal caused us to get skin infections. One girl was affected so badly she had to go to hospital and take time off.”

Dr Emanuele Lugli, a lecturer at the Istituto Marangoni fashion and design school, says young people put up with these conditions because internships have become essential for anyone who wants a career in the industry.

“Students are constantly telling me how companies are staffing entire departments with interns who work incredibly long hours and are put under enormous pressure,” he says. “But they still want to do internships at these places because they are desperate for the experience and to work for these big-name brands.”

However, designer Anna Heinrup, a successful fashion consultant, points out that interns can play an important and mutually beneficial role in helping fledgling designers off the ground.

“Some start-ups depend on interns to survive,” she explains. “And when I was an intern I had better experiences in small companies because I felt I had more responsibility and could make a real difference.”

But not all her experiences were positive. “I worked for one designer for three months where the interns did everything and she didn’t even know our names,” she says. “There were 10 interns and just three staff and we had to work from 9.30am until up to 10pm in a freezing cold building. The designer didn’t care if we were looked after or not because there were lots of young people willing to go there.”

While some fashion interns find themselves under intense pressure, others report being required to carry out mundane tasks for weeks on end, giving them little experience of value.

“I was left alone all day in a small fashion cupboard with no windows and no chair, and the only thing I had to do was send samples back to PRs and tidy up the cupboard,” says a former intern with a leading women’s fashion magazine. “There was nothing creative on offer at all.”

Not all interns have a negative experience, however. “I did some really exciting things like go on a cover shoot and work with well-known models,” says a former intern at the London office of an international fashion magazine. “It was really friendly and I enjoyed myself.”

Another former fashion student, who spent three months working unpaid as a marketing assistant with a well-known UK fashion house, says the internship was organised around her needs, not the other way round.

“I saw all sides of the business,” she says, “so I got a real insight into how the industry works, helping me decide what I wanted to do.”

Alex Try of Interns Anonymous, an online forum for interns, argues that the increasing popularity of unpaid internships may actually be making it more difficult for new graduates to get employment.

“Posts that were previously offered to new graduates are now being staffed by unpaid interns,” he says, “so entry-level jobs are disappearing. Why would a company fork out £15,000 to £20,000 a year for an entry-level fashion designer, when they have an endless supply of people willing to do it for free?”

There have, however, been successful challenges to employers who take advantage of interns. Work reader Michelle Jackson was paid £1,000 for work she had done during a six-week internship with an advertising agency after her tax office told her she might be entitled to the minimum wage.

“They put me in touch with the National Minimum Wage Helpline who investigated the agency and found they had a history of using unpaid placements as free labour,” she says. “They were ordered to pay me for the work I’d done as well as any other students they had employed and not paid.”

Last November, an employment tribunal ordered London Dream Motion Pictures to make backdated minimum wage payments to Nicola Vetta, an art department assistant who had been taken on by the company on an expenses-only basis.

Martin Spence, assistant general secretary of Bectu, the union that supported Vetta’s case, was optimistic that the ruling would set a precedent. “We hope this judgment will draw a line in the sand and we will see more employers complying with the law,” he said.

Others, however, think a more fundamental change is needed, such as setting a limit on how long someone is allowed to work unpaid.

“Three months would be an appropriate limit for the length of internships, because an organisation should know by then whether they want to give someone a job or not,” says Stephen Overell, associate director of The Work Foundation. “Internships should be about giving people an insight into the sector they are interested in working in, but they should not flip over into working for free.”

*Name has been changed

Some employees of D&D London, which runs the glamorous Quaglino’s, Pont de la Tour and other former Sir Terence Conran restaurants, claim levels of service have suffered because they no longer have an incentive to be as attentive.

“Cash tips used to go straight into our pockets and I’d get between £50 and £100 a week on top of my basic pay of £7 per hour,” says a waiter at the chain’s flagship Bluebird restaurant, Chelsea, where a main course can cost more than £50. “Now I’m lucky if I see £20 in tips each week, and sometimes get as little as £10.”

“I only earn £6 per hour and end up with a lot less each week now than I did before they changed what happens to the cash tips,” adds a waiter at another of the company’s London restaurant. “But I don’t see what I can do, as they are doing this at all D&D London restaurants.”

The company told staff in September that, from 1 October, cash tips would be treated in the same way as credit card gratuities, and processed through the payroll. Previously only credit card tips were used to pay salaries – cash tips went straight to staff.

Now the company uses all tips to pay staff the portion of salary they get above the minimum wage of £5.80.

“They called a meeting to tell us what they were planning, and lots of people protested because we could see it meant a pay cut,” says the Bluebird waiter.

The change in policy has, according to some staff, hit morale and reduced the level of service enjoyed by diners.

“Staff are really unhappy and it affects how you treat customers. If you get the tips, you give a good service, but if you don’t, you don’t bother because you’re not getting what you deserve. I’m sure customers could tell something was wrong,” says a waiter who worked for D&D London for two years but left because of the change to how cash tips were managed.

“I was losing about £100 [a week in cash tips] after 1 October and just couldn’t make any real money.”

A waiter, who still works at Bluebird, adds: “People serving are less friendly and polite and customers have to wait longer.

“Staff don’t care so much anymore because there isn’t any incentive to provide a good service.”

The new approach to cash tips coincided with a change in the law on 1 October which banned restaurants from using the service charge and other tips to pay the national minimum wage.

Like some other chains, D&D London had been contributing as little as £2.50 per hour, of its own money to staff pay, with the rest being met by a 12.5% service charge added to customers’ bills and paid to staff through a system with special tax rules known as a tronc. After the law change, however, instead of passing on to staff the portion of the service charge they were no longer able to use to pay the minimum wage, D&D London abolished service charges altogether.

“As a group, D&D London scrapped the discretionary service charge from 1 October because we believe it will result in better service and a fairer deal for customers,” says Simon Willis, marketing director for the company.

The 1 October law change also meant that employees had to pay national insurance on all of the national minimum wage for the first time. Under the old rules, the share of the £5.80 national minimum paid for by the service charge – most of it, in the case of D&D London – was exempt from national insurance.

“Some of us are paying more national insurance now because of the new legislation, which means we get less basic pay than we did before,” a bar tender says. Willis acknowledges the recent changes have affected staff pay, but points out his company is acting within the rules.

“All tips received at Bluebird, whether cash or credit card, are pooled and shared between the staff through the independent tronc committee,” he said. “Tips do not go to the company. The troncmaster or tronc committee, acting on behalf of the staff, makes the decision on pooling and allocating monies collected in the tronc, and not the employer. Gross earnings have remained the same.

“However, national insurance contributions are now due, for some staff, on a larger proportion of those earnings due to national minimum wage commitments. The average level of tips collected in our restaurants, including Bluebird, is higher than we expected and this will result overall in our staff being paid more in the long term.”

Some restaurant chains have responded differently to the 1 October law change. Tragus for instance – which owns Cafe Rouge, Strada and Bella Italia, now passes on 90% of the service charge to staff, on top of the minimum wage. In addition, cash tips go straight to individual waiters or groups of waiters who divide them up as they please.

“Staff are much happier now and my pay has increased by as much as 20%, depending on how busy we are,” says a waitress at a Cafe Rouge restaurant. “Customers are getting better service too, because we know the tips they leave will go to us.”