Most sandstone used for paving in the UK comes from remote quarries in Rajasthan. Some importers of the stone are working with the Ethical Trading Initiative to improve the conditions of workers there in order to secure supplies of stones such as Raj Green.

Anyone involved in hard landscaping these days is probably as familiar with Fossil Mint, Raj Green, Autumn Brown and Kandla Grey as they are with York stone. The first four (and even some of what is sold as York stone) come from India – and India accounts for about 60% of the stone imported by the UK that is used as paving of one sort or another, according to figures from HM Revenue & Customs.

These are all sandstones and 70% of India’s sandstone is extracted from quarries in Rajasthan in the north-west of the country.

Many of the quarries producing the stone are remote… really remote. Nobody knows how many people are employed in them – estimates vary between 80,000 and 300,000.

What is indisputable is that nearly all of those people are from what are these days called Scheduled Castes and Tribes – the Dalits, or ‘untouchables’. Husbands and wives often work together and bring their children to work with them, expecting the youngsters to contribute, even if that means carrying, stacking and trimming hefty lumps of stone. It is estimated that at least 20% of the workforce in the quarries are women. Nobody even guesses how many children there are. There is often no power to help them work nor any personal protective equipment. Injuries are common but go unrecorded.

Some of the people in the quarries do not even get paid. They are working to pay off debts – often debts from other family members. Some of the debts cannot be paid off in one lifetime but are handed down from generation to generation. This is bonded labour.

Bonded labour has been illegal in India since 1976, but even the Indian government accepts there are still 250,000 people working in this way among India’s 1.2billion population. Unofficial figures suggest it could be as many as 65million. There is no question some of them are in the sandstone quarries of Rajasthan.

That is the background against which a group of UK importers of sandstone from Rajasthan have joined forces under the banner of the Ethical Trading Initiative (ETI) to try to improve the conditions of those in the quarries. In October, they met in London to launch their initiative (see NSS November 2013).

Debbie Coulter, Head of Programmes at the ETI, said: “It’s going to be very challenging for these stone group members. It’s going to require real, on-the-ground commitment and activity.”

The companies involved include Marshalls, the £300 million-a-year hard landscaping group with headquarters in Yorkshire, and Hardscape, which has just entered the top 1,000 Inspiring SMEs (a London Stock Exchange accolade). Both have championed ethical trading for longer than most with successes that include building schools for the children of their suppliers in India. Chris Harrop, Marshalls’ Group Marketing Director, chaired the launch event while Glenn Bradley, Hardscape’s Ethical Trade Manager, gave his experienced advice to those attending.

The others in the group are Beltrami (which is more involved in hard landscaping on mainland Europe than it is in the UK), Brett, CED, DNS Stones, Hardscape, London Stone, Natural Paving, Pavestone and Stone Masters.

They pay a subscription to the ETI, although the ETI is also supported by government funds – and it is one of the few areas of government expenditure that has not been cut in the past four years – although it only gets £400,000 a year.

Also involved is Anti-Slavery International, Dalit Solidarity Network and a Trade Union Caucus Representative.

An essential part of their initiative is having a representative, Rana Alok Singh, on the ground in India. As Meena Varma from the Dalit Solidarity Network in the UK said at the launch of the Rajasthan sandstone initiative: “What we say here [in London] means nothing until we take it to India.”

This year the ETI Rajasthan Sandstone Working Group will be going to Rajasthan to meet the quarry operators, workers and the wider community, including representatives of local and regional government. They want to build relationships with key stakeholders to try to get laws regarding workers’ rights and the need for physical protection in a dangerous environment understood and enforced. In some cases the improvements would simply be making fresh drinking water available.

The approach is based on the United Nations’ framework of guiding principles on business and human rights drawn up by John Ruggie. It is known as the Ruggie Framework and is summed up as: Protect, respect, remedy.

The UK companies taking part in the initiative find themselves in an awkward position. Among themselves they feel no need to justify what they are doing to help a group of people they do not know personally. But that is not usually the motivating factor of business. Steven Walley, the Managing Director of Sandstone Working Group company London Stone, admits there is “not a simple answer” to the question why they do it. He says: “The value is not obvious at first”

Apart from the simple humanity aspect, he concedes there is a commercial element. “It’s not the case you get loads of orders by being signed up to the ETI initiative but it improves the supply chains.” 

He hopes that better working conditions in the quarries will result in more care being taken over the products he buys from them, with less waste through damage during transport because they are better packaged.

Chris Harrop from Marshalls, who also Chairs the United Nations Global Compact in the UK, agrees. He says people are sometimes concerned that improving working conditions will raise the price of the stone, but in Marshalls’ experience it doesn’t because it results in efficiency improvements. “I don’t think we can just say we can’t do this because it makes things more expensive, because in our experience it doesn’t.”

Duncan Robertson, Production Planner at Brett Landscaping in Leicestershire, says one thing they have done is try to place orders for six months at a time, so the producer has security about the future and can plan better. “In the UK, the more you buy the better the price. It’s not necessarily the same in India. Trying to do things better does have an impact and we have to understand the full effect. Part of the journey we’ve had through the ETI is understanding these things.”

The point about signing up to the ETI schemes is to head off concerns in the West about the conditions of workers in India. There is not, perhaps, the same level of concern about conditions in quarries as their is about conditions in clothing factories, for example, because fewer people are using stone at any one time than are wearing clothes. Nevertheless, stone suppliers do report a level of concern about human rights (as well as the environment) among planners and architects regarding stone sourced from India and China.

And while the importers try to head off those concerns by demonstrating they are actively involved in programmes such as the ETI’s, British stone suppliers report that there has been some level of increase in the use of British stone for paving. And it is not just sandstone.

Limestone does not have quite the slip resistance advantage of sandstone or flame-finished granite, but it still compares well with many man-made surfaces and is proving popular, especially in domestic applications. In London, for example, many people would be surprised how many patios and paths are made of Portland limestone.

But whether it is imported or indigenous, natural stone is still favoured in hard landscaping projects and the landscaping market does show signs of picking up. As Marshalls said in a statement at the start of this year: “The Construction Products Association’s Autumn Forecast predicts growth [in construction] of 2.7% in 2014 and 4.6% in 2015… Street furniture, landscape water management and internal natural stone flooring continue to be seen as growth areas in addition to the commitment to [paving in] home, rail and retail.”

A word about mortars from Ultrascape

Ultrascape’s mortar paving system and Cempoint were specified by Capita Symonds, the project architect for the Greater Bargoed Community Regeneration Project in Wales.

The public realm regeneration scheme used Chinese granite as part of a major project to improve transport links in the upper Rhymney Valley with the aim of attracting new investment into the area.

The work was carried out by major Welsh civil engineer and contractor Alun Griffiths (Contractors) Ltd. The Ultrascape mortar paving system used consisted of Pro-Bed HS bedding mortar, Pro-Prime slurry primer and Flowpoint flowable grout.

The system is BS 7533 compliant under UKAS testing for compressive, flexural and adhesive bond strengths, shrinkage and other criteria.

The Ultrascape Pro-Bed HS was delivered in bulk – especially good where a site has limited storage space. The bulk mortar silo from Ultrascape can hold more than 30tonnes of material. These bulk mortar silos feature a single chamber design to deliver the same, single part, pre-blended, high quality material you find in the company’s 25kg bags.

Cempoint is a gun injected mortar for use in smaller areas that can be difficult to grout. It is used to fill the paving joint quickly and easily. It was used throughout the Bargoed project for jointing steps.

Ultrascape is a brand of the Instarmac Group plc and a member of BALI.

London Stone to open new depot in Essex

London Stone, which has its head offices in Langley, Middlesex, and is one of the companies involved in the Ethical Trading Initiative Rajasthan sandstone project (see main story), is opening a new depot in Essex in April.

This will be the company’s third outlet, coming just a year after it opened in Kent at Coolings Garden Centre in Knockholt.

Construction work on the new showroom got underway on 13 January. The picture shows an artist’s impression of what the finished depot will look like.

Steven Walley, the London Stone Managing Director, says the company has been working hard behind the scenes on this project for the past six months.

“Having a presence north-east of the M25 has always been part of our long term strategy and we are delighted that our clients in Essex, Hertfordshire and north-east London will now finally have easy access to a London Stone showroom.”

London Stone would like to have more outlets eventually, although Steven Walley wants them to be easily serviced by the company’s main stockholding site at Langley, near junction 15 of the M25, so there is no need for a second stockyard. The sites in Kent and Essex are within easy reach of the M25.

London Stone is a stone industry success story. The company was established in December 2005 by Gavin, Steven and Duncan Walley, three brothers from Stoke on Trent with a background in hard landscaping.

Looking to diversify their landscaping business, the brothers decided to import natural stone paving from India themselves. They intended to use it for their own contracts as well as selling it to other contractors, but the sales side of the business took off and they pulled out of contracting so they would not be competing with their new customer base.

New CE-marked commercial range from Natural Paving Products

Building on its success in the domestic and landscaping sectors, Natural Paving Products (UK) Ltd, one of the companies signed up to the Ethical Trading Initiative Rajasthan sandstone programme (see main story), has launched a new collection of products and a bespoke design and specification service aimed specifically at the commercial market.

The collection brings together carefully selected products from across Natural Paving Products’ portfolio to form a core range suited to commercial and high specification paving projects.

The range comprises not only a variety of Indian sandstones but also those from the UK and granite and limestone. The collection is available in various shapes, sizes and finishes as standard and can also be tailored to meet bespoke requirements.

The products have been selected for their superior flexural strength and slip resistance in both wet and dry conditions, making them ideal for high traffic areas in retail and public environments.

Alison Lockwood, recently appointed as Commercial Manager for Natural Paving Products, says: “We have a vast portfolio of products that allows for true design freedom and we are committed to ensuring the supply and quality of our stone meets customers’ demands – whether they are a major construction company building a new retail centre or high street or Mr and Mrs Smith designing a luxury sun terrace for their home.”

As Natural Paving Products owns quarries, the company is able to offer a complete end-to-end service with control over the quality, supply and distribution of its products.

Having invested heavily in its supply chain, Natural Paving Products has strong links with its distribution network, which is serviced from three depots across the UK in Doncaster, Grangemouth and Tilbury, ensuring speedy delivery to projects across the country.

And with major contractors and end users concerned about sustainability throughout the supply chain, Natural Paving Products says its commitment to ethical trading means its products can be specified with confidence. As part of the Ethical Trading Initiative, the company works hard to ensure high standards of sustainability both in India and the UK.

Natural Paving Products has also made a substantial investment in product testing to ensure its products are compliant with the new Construction Products Regulation. All products are fully CE marked and accompanied by a Declaration of Performance.

For a brochure of the new range and swatches email rhughes@naturalpaving.co.uk. To discuss a project in more detail contact sales@naturalpaving.co.uk.