Reporter,
March 8
Hong Kong
Hong Kong's foreign domestic helpers celebrated the 100th Women's Day in Hong Kong on Sunday by marching to the Hong Kong Government headquarters.
Few hundred domestic helpers from Phillipines, Indonesia and Thailand are said to have joined the rally. They demanded that the foreign domestic helpers be included in the scheme of minimum wage that Hong Kong is mulling to enact.
Under the scheme Hong Kong's employers will be required to pay the minimum wage as stipulated by the law. However, foreign domestic helpers are not included in the scheme in the current discussion.
There are around three hundred thousand domestic helpers working in Hong Kong. A large proportion of the domestic workforce comes from Indonesia and Phillipines, and rest are from Thailand, Nepal, India and Sri Lanka. Hong Kong Government has already implemented a minimum wage scheme for the domestic helpers. The minimum salary of the domestic helpers currently is said to be around 3560 Hong Kong dollars.
Hong Kong is considered to be the safest place for women domestic workers from developing countries. Observers claim that there is no such place in the world as safe as Hong Kong where there is the highest regard for human rights.
Domestic workers in the Middle East constantly complain of being sexually abused by the employers. However, these kind of cases are rarely found in Hong Kong. Isolated cases of abuse are dealt with according to the law and the Government of Hong Kong leaves no stone unturned to bring the culprits into justice.
