Labor | New study sheds light on plight of HK domestic workers

In this 2014 file photo, foreign maids holding picture of 23-year-old Indonesia migrant Erwiana Sulistyaningsih who was brutally tortured by her employers for months in Hong Kong

A new study released in Hong Kong on the plight of Filipino domestic workers in the nearby city has brought to the surface further evidence of the systematic and illegal exploitation that many are subjected to.
The study, titled “Between a Rock and a Hard Place,” includes interviews with 68 Filipino domestic workers as well as the results from inspections of and visits to 10 placement agencies between October 2015 and June this year.
Among the illegal activities highlighted in the study are “excessive” agency fees that in some cases amounted to 25 times the lawful limit, confiscation of passports and other important documentation, and denial of the freedom to leave their employers’ homes for outings, at times forcing the workers to sever ties with family and friends in the Philippines.
Unlike the situation in Macau, foreign domestic workers in Hong Kong are required to live-in with their employers. If they leave or lose their job, the workers have just two weeks to find another before they are required to leave the city.
Placement agencies in Hong Kong seek to profit from the two-
week rule by arranging for Filipino workers to be sent to Macau while their new work visa is being processed. The study unveiled a total of 24 women who traveled to Macau after their contracts were terminated and were subsequently charged an average of HKD5,778 in agency fees.
According to the study, the problematic and illegal treatment of foreign workers – which activists label as “forced labor” – is extremely prevalent in Hong Kong. Around 72 percent of study respondents said that they have been subject to at least some form of exploitation.
Hong Kong’s Labor Department told the South China Morning Post that they deny accusations that forced labor is being practiced in the city.
“We strongly refute any suggestion that foreign domestic helpers’ work in Hong Kong is anything close to a form of forced labor,” a spokesman for the Department told the newspaper.
The authors of “Between a Rock and Hard Place” also drew attention to the fact that only 23 agencies have been fined in the last two and a half years for charging excessive placement fees (averaging HKD11,320), even though some 5,000 inspections have been carried out. DB