Union calls for passage of Labour Regulation Bill to protect rights of domestic workers

The Domestic Services Workers Union (DSWU) of the Trades Union Congress (TUC) has called on the government to pass the Labour (Domestic Workers) Regulation Bill 2016 and ratify the International Labour Organisation (ILO) Convention 189 which canvasses for the effective promotion and protection of the human rights of domestic workers.

When passed, the law will give proper and official form to the relationship between domestic workers and their employers and also serve to protect the workers against abuse.The law will also cover contract of employment, wages and benefits, maximum hours, rest periods, leave, among other requirements.

In addition, it will accelerate the recognition and respect accorded domestic workers as being equal in stature to any other workers found in both formal or informal employment.

Past Parliament

At a press conference in Accra yesterday on the occasion of the union’s second anniversary, the General Secretary of the DSWU, Ms Esther Kosi, said the bill had been expected to be passed by the past Parliament but, unfortunately, it had still not been discussed.

She urged the government to heed the call to ratify ILO Convention 189 on Decent Work for Domestic Workers as a means of providing an overall framework for conditions of service for workers in Ghana.

Rights of domestic workers

Ms Kosi indicated that the rights of domestic workers had been overlooked for far too long, in spite of the hard work they put in to make a living for themselves.

According to her, a large chunk of the people in the domestic labour force continued to work under master-slave conditions, resulting in some of them suffering various kinds of abuse, including sexual harassment.

“Domestic workers have rights, and just like workers everywhere, they must be accorded respect and recognition, since they contribute enormously to the socio-economic value of their employers and the nation, by extension,” she said.

The general secretary said it was about time domestic work was recognised as a paid job, with its attendant conditions of service, including social security remittances, rights and protection.

She further urged stakeholders to construct an integrated model for the enforcement of regulations and domestic workers’ rights when the law was passed.

In conformity with its mandate to promote the welfare of its members, Ms Kosi said, the union was educating, training, organising and recruiting more members to demand and defend their rights.

Experiences

Sharing her ordeal as a domestic worker, Madam Sarah Akweley Yemo, a member of the union, recollected how her former employer had sacked her suddenly and unexpectedly, citing her age as an excuse, after almost five years of service.

She, therefore, called on the government to take the welfare of domestic workers seriously and protect their rights.