Safe and Beneficial Migration: The Protection and Regulation of Foreign Domestic Workers in Singapore and Hong Kong

Abstract

Globalisation has often being described as an economic process that heavily influences the immigration policies of nation states. Highly industrialised nations in Southeast Asia like Singapore and Hong Kong face the problem of too many jobs and not enough labourers. As the research paper by Noleen Heyzer and others stated: “ importing labour is one way of dealing with sustained economic growth”. Local women in both Singapore and Hong Kong has been encouraged to re-enter the workforce, thus leaving a gap in home for foreign domestic workers to do the day to day task of childcare, housework and looking after elderly relatives. While international labour migration is not new, what has emerged in recent years is a new class of transmigrants who “move within a global hierarchy of desirable destination countries”. Filipino domestic workers for example can be quite selective in their place of employment, and often based their choice on what they perceived are “safer” destinations. The factors that influence them are salaries, legal entitlements that migrant workers can claim, the cost and risk of entering a nation state to work and the perceived attractiveness of their host countries compare to their homeland. According to the International Labour Migration Report of 2006, it is “estimated that nearly two thirds of migrant workers in the Asian region are made out of women from the Philipines, Indonesia and Sri Lanka”. The Philipines is now Asia Pacific region’s largest export of female domestic workers. Organisations like the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women focuses on “promoting safe migration for women” and ensuring that the whole migration process is an effective and beneficial one. In order for the migration of female domestic workers to be safe, effective and beneficial, they should received decent wages, a written and enforceable employment contract and have the power to make changes to their working conditions. This paper looks at Singapore and Hong Kong immigration laws and migrant labour regulations. Singapore and Hong Kong are the two major recipients of female domestic workers in Asia. The other key players in migration governance are the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Conventions, recruitment agencies in both sending and receiving countries, and the home countries themselves. The main argument is that an informal approach to migration governance can be detrimental to foreign domestic workers. Host countries should ensure that foreign domestic workers are given equal treatment. Human rights protections are important aspects of migration governance. Free trade agreements like the Asian Framework Agreement on Services should provide social safety nets. Labour sending nations and host nations should work together for the benefit of foreign domestic workers.