Foreign Workers – compare & contrast

Here is an excerpt from a newspaper article I read recently:

They have also been denied their rights to good working conditions and have literally been forced to work long hours without overtime or any entitlement. And many of them live in crammed accommodation, a condition no local worker would tolerate.

The reason for not prosecuting most of these employers is because the foreign workers are generally not prepared to talk about the alleged exploitation – least of all testifying in court – for fear of losing their jobs and being sent back to their home countries.

I read the following in another online newspaper:

‘We have received hundreds of complaints from foreign workers on cheating, non-payment of wages, poor working conditions and a host of other issues.

“Labour suppliers issue (permits) and collect RM8,000 to RM10,000, which was later said to be forged documents.

“The poor foreign worker (eventually) ends up in detention camps despite paying out huge sums of money (to the supplier),” he said in a statement today.

The first was reporting on the exploitation of foreign workers in Australia, the second on the same matter in Malaysia. So foreign workers are being exploited everywhere, some are forced into longer hours and harder labour, while others areforced into detention camps. I wonder whether this is what we mean when we say we want to reach global standards.

But let’s look at what each government is doing. In the same article on Australia, the government there proposes to introduce new legislation which sets out to:

• protect the rights of foreign workers, while protecting the employment and training opportunities of Australians
• ensure that sponsoring employers meet obligations regarded as fair and reasonable to all concerned until the foreign worker return to her home country
• oblige sponsoring employers to pay to the government A$10,000 for locating and detaining foreign workers if they refuse or are unable to return to their home countries
• prohibit sponsoring employers from cutting foreign workers’ pay for the costs of any mandatory licence or registration, although they may recover such fees from the workers, provided that their pay does not fall below the nation’s minimum wage
• oblige employers in footing the bill of education and medical expenses for the children of foreign workers, if they who are allowed entry into Australia

Among other things. Sounds fair, does it not? International cutting edge etc, no?

Now, the Malaysian policy, from what I’ve heard:

This will be passed in Parliament in 2020, and will be published in the Gazette in 2057.

So I heard.

News:
The Star
The Malaysian Insider