What makes a ‘Good Practice’? - Migrant Rights

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During the Migration for Development Knowledge Fair, Roundtable Consultations focusing on the thematic area of ‘Migrant Rights’ discussed 3 specific areas:

1. Pre-departure information provided to (departing) migrants and general information provided to prospective migrants;
2. Issues related to migrants’ family members who remain in the countries of origin;
3. Issues related to recruitment practices.

The consultation is now continuing online here to allow all members of the Migration for Development community to provide your inputs to these questions. Please use the ‘Comments’ section below to share your responses and examples. These will be incorporated into the final, community-owned, report - a first step towards defining what makes a ‘Good Practice’ in the area of Migrant Rights. Comments may also be sent to the community at m4d@groups.dev-nets.org.

1. Pre-departure information provided to (departing) migrants and general information provided to prospective migrants:

The main consideration felt by participants in the consultation is that the information provided to migrations is essentially a government matter. Civil society can and should be supportive and undertake complementary activities, but the provision of pre-departure information is a government responsibility as part of its general duty to protect its citizens. This principle is even more applicable when it is the policy of the state to export its labour force abroad, for example the Philippines. In such cases, it is also in the state’s interest to ensure that migrants have a good understanding of their rights, including how to send remittances home.

An example of a good practice in this area is therefore where the government and local authorities organize information sessions for both potential migrants and departing migrants. This is the case for example in the Philippines with half-day sessions, and in Sri Lanka, where information sessions are held for 14 to 21 days, with accommodation and food provided.  However, a small number of problems with this approach have been identified:

• Half-day sessions are too short and seem to serve only to comply with the minimum requirements of the duty to inform. Information provided to migrants at such short sessions is very basic and often received too late or too near to the date of departure.
• The information provided is not specific to the country or region of destination. For example, seafarers require very specific information, as do Asian migrant workers travelling to the Middle East.
• Such sessions should focus on rights and not only provide practical details, e.g. how to open a bank account in a destination country.

The overall objective of providing  pre-departure information should be to empower the migrant and give him/her confidence that in case of problems, there are mechanisms in place to assist them. In many countries laws to protect migrants exist, but migrants do not take advantage of these laws, as they are not aware of them.  KNOWLEDGE IS POWER. The motto should be ‘know your rights before you go’!!, particularly given that migrants often come from countries where the concept of enforceable rights is not widely known or respected.

Recommendations:

• Embassies should closely monitor their citizens’ situations in host countries and follow up on individual cases;
• The use of mass media campaigns/mobile information services should be promoted;
• Conduct in-depth and objective research to document good practices in this area, and disseminate this knowledge through accessible means. UN responsibility is called for to ensure that biased information is not spread.
• Inputs from Trade Unions should be sought more.

2. Issues related to migrants’ family members who remain in the countries of origin:

Often, migrants’ family members find themselves extremely vulnerable due to several factors:

• (Extreme) Dependency on receiving remittances;
• Cases of abandonment by the migrants who start a new life, with a new family, etc.;
• Issue of childcare.

Good practices include: promoting and raising awareness of the possibility of family reunification in host countries, where possible. Pre-departure information sessions should be made available to all family members - both those who go and those who stay - in order to anticipate and provide them with the tools to deal with possible problems, for example by creating a network of family members left behind to support each other.

The issue of temporary/circular migration was raised. In many instances, nothing is more permanent than what is meant to be temporary. The problem is that temporary migration carries even fewer rights than permanent migration, particularly for low or no skilled migrants. It was noted that family reunification for highly-skilled migrants is very rarely an issue.

3. Issues related to recruitment practices:

The main question is how to hold recruitment agencies accountable in both countries of origin and countries of destination. The regulation of recruitment practices is clearly a government responsibility. There needs to be a consistent and equitable implementation of relevant policies. The onus is on the state system to carry out this role.  States should feel more concerned and should be more involved in ensuring recruitment agencies act responsibly to protect their citizens.

Recommendations:

• Consular offices should have the capacity to protect the rights of their citizens working in the destination country. The role of labour and social welfare attachés should be strengthened.
• More individual complaints should be lodged at national level when there is abuse or exploitation. The problem is that this path is tedious and expensive and often the migrant does not agree to it, as it may jeopardize his/her situation. Another problem linked to this is when in lodging a case the responsibility is diluted because there are too many layers in the recruitment process. However, the role of Trade Unions is important to document, collect evidence and report on cases of abuse.
• Civil society should reach out to and monitor large migration and recruitment agencies and the private sector, and verify whether the information provided to migrant workers is correct, reliable and sufficient.

It is not an acceptable situation when people are tolerated to stay in a country but are not allowed to work, for example certain categories of asylum seekers in Europe. This situation increases the dependency syndrome and leads to criminalization and anti-social behaviour.

Final remarks

Overall, one general impression is that, globally, rights are increasingly less respected and that we are regressing in this area, so that it is a challenge to protect the rights of migrants in particular.

One perverse effect may be that the more sending countries protect the right of their migrating citizens, the fewer opportunities these people will have to be recruited, as employing countries will turn to easier, less problematic labour pools. In this way, increased awareness of migrant rights may lead to a decrease in recruitment, which is not what sending countries want.

Please use the ‘Comments’ section below to add your responses and examples. Comments may also be sent to the community at m4d@groups.dev-nets.org.

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