New measures being readied to boost protection for domestic helpers

New measures are being prepared to boost the protection of household service workers (HSWs) who are working or are about to work abroad.

Labor Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz vowed to move decisively in reviewing the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration’s guidelines on the matter.

“There is a call for the DOLE to really make a serious effort to protect the most vulnerable of our OFWs — the household service workers — so it is high time for us to review the HSW reform package,” Baldoz said during a consultative meeting with the DOLE’s labor attaches who are now in the Philippines.

Baldoz said the review is in line with President Benigno Simeon “Noynoy” Aquino’s 22-point labor and employment agenda, particularly on the implementation of the Anti-Trafficking in Persons Act of 2003 and on addressing the social costs of migration.

The agenda calls for the DOLE to work closely with communities and families of OFWs to provide effective social welfare services, and to pursue and prosecute those engaging in illegal and predatory activities.

Such people include fixers, scammers, and especially traffickers who target women and children.

During the consultative meeting, Baldoz impressed upon the labor attaché corps the need to quickly bring home all distressed OFWs, particularly the HSWs, in all Filipino Workers Resource Centers in all labor offices worldwide.

She also reminded them to ensure they are given full and complete social and economic assistance to facilitate their re-integration into their families and home communities upon their return.

“Our marching orders are clear. We really have to act quickly and show concrete results in terms of ensuring full protection to all OFWs,” Baldoz said.

Other initial measures that Baldoz discussed included:

* Ensuring that the Technical Education and Skills Development Authority improves the quality of its skills assessment and certification system for HSWs before they leave abroad;
* Tapping qualified OFWs who have returned to the country to provide their services in pre-departure orientation seminars;
* Directing the POEA to strictly enforce its ‘no reprocessing’ policy;
* Directing the labor offices to implement improved accreditation of HSW employers and the blacklisting of abusive ones, as well as the preventive suspension of erring licensed recruitment agencies deploying HSWs;
* Improving and fast-tracking case build-up on welfare cases;
* Strict monitoring of HSW training, including the worker’s personal appearance in pre-departure orientation seminar and post-arrival orientation; and
* Working closely with host governments, as well as with officials of other government agencies, such as the Department of Foreign Affairs and the Bureau of Immigration and Deportation, to ensure that HSWs who leave undergo strict legal processes.

Baldoz pledged to exercise firm resolve in seeing to it that the HSW reform package that she initiated in 2006 will be revitalized as a tool not only to combat human trafficking, but also as a social protective mechanism for the most vulnerable among OFWs.

The US State Department’s 2010 Trafficking in Persons Report placed the Philippines under Tier 2 Watch List for the second consecutive year, indicating that the country was unable to meet minimum standards of the Trafficking Victims Protection Act, but are making efforts to comply.

“The (Philippine) government did not show evidence of significant progress in convicting trafficking offenders, particularly those responsible for labor trafficking,” the report stated. – JMA, RJAB Jr., GMANews.TV