Saudi sets up grievance committees for household service workers

Saudi Arabia has set up grievance committees where household service workers (HSWs) there, among them Filipinos, could file their complaints.

“Under Saudi regulations, household workers in all categories are now entitled to file their complaints through Grievance Committees with the Saudi Ministry of Labor,” the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said in a news release Monday.

Apart from setting up grievance committees, the Saudi Ministry of Labor has also launched a website, www.musaned.gov.sa, about laws that affect HSWs.

The website contains a comprehensive brochure in various languages, including Tagalog. Copies of the same brochure have earlier been circulated by the Philippine Embassy in Saudi Arabia.

In a seminar last week, Philippine Labor Attaché Rustico Dela Fuente reminded embassy and labor personnel about the website.

The seminar, where the website and the grievance committees were among the topics discussed, was just one of the many activities held recently in order to update all embassy and attached services personnel on various laws and regulations affecting Filipinos in the Kingdom.

“The seminars are part of our efforts to ensure our Embassy personnel are fully equipped to help our nationals within the framework of the local laws,” Philippine Ambassador to Saudi Arabia Ezzedin Tago said.

“We must constantly and regularly update our personnel on changes in laws and regulations that affect our nationals especially on the international level, and within the Kingdom and the Philippines,” he added. “We are doing this first at the level of our personnel before our officials embark on some outreach missions to update our nationals on laws that affect them.”

The lectures and seminars were conducted by Dela Fuente and spanned three days focusing on the Saudi Labor Law and its recent amendments, changes in the residency regulations and penalties for violations, the Philippines-Saudi Arabia agreement on domestic workers, and Royal Decree 310 approving the codified framework for the protection of HSWs.

The DFA said the embassy will soon conduct similar courses for community members, and will harness online platforms for the disseminaiton of advisories and new regulations. —KBK, GMA News