Looking beyond the minimum: The case of justice for women domestic workers

Author: Ranjani K. Murthy, June 17 2014 - It is three years since the ILO [International Labour Organization] Domestic Workers Convention (C 189) was adopted on June 16, 2011 (ILO, n.da). The Convention emphasises State responsibility in elimination of child domestic worker, discrimination in employment and forced domestic work. It also recognises the right of domestic workers to form associations and to bargain. 

Member States are to be responsible for ensuring that workers enjoy fair terms of employment as well as decent working conditions and, if they reside in the household, decent living conditions that respect their privacy. It calls for written contracts between employer-employee outlining the nature and terms and conditions of work (Including wages, hours of work per day, daily, weekly and annual leave, access to food and accommodation where applicable). It further adds that Member States should fix minimum wages for domestic work and not discriminate between sexes. Social security should be provided to domestic workers, including maternity cover. It puts the responsibility on the state to ensure that domestic workers enjoy protection against all forms of abuse, harassment and violence. However, only fourteen countries have ratified the Convention as of 18th, June, 2014 (ILO, ndb). None of the South Asian countries have as yet ratified the Convention. India does not even have a legislation protecting domestic workers, though a draft was prepared in 2010. 

The working conditions, safety and social security of women and child domestic workers in South Asia are far removed from the rights enshrined in the ILO Domestic Workers Convention, 2011. Though, without their work, their employer’s family’s economy and South Asian economy would not have grown in the last decade; their condition and position has barely grown. Why is that? There are four factors:

1. There is a gender division of labour, with more women/girls found in the same than men/boys. Men are found as drivers, watchpersons, electricians, plumbers, painters etc. The latter jobs fetch four times the income as domestic workers. Thus there is a gender-based valuation of work. Domestic workers who cook (both women and men) earn more than those who clean, but normally not as much as drivers etc. Men cooks earn more than women cooks. However, even men cooks would earn 1/10th of what the employers earns in a month. THUS NOT MINIMUM WAGES, BUT EQUAL AND JUST WAGES ARE REQUIRIED.
2. Women domestic workers come from disadvantaged castes, ethnic groups and geographical areas. These identities interlock. and they are often victims or survivors of structural exploitation, like not being allowed to sit on the chair, called a servant, eat from same plate as employer, use the same toilet as employer, being suspected if something is misplaced and (at worst) being subject to sexual exploitation. TERMS AND CONDITIONS SPELT OUT IN CONTRACT SHOULD GO BEYOND ENSURING ‘ECONOMIC MINIMUMS’ AND ENSURE HUMAN DIGNITY OF DOMESTIC WORKERS. SENSITISING EMPLOYERS ON ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL MINIMUMS IS A MUST.
3. Women domestic workers must be organised to not only bargain with state and employers, but also take up cases of human rights violations. While there are several initiatives in urban areas to organise women domestic workers, those in rural areas have been hardly organised. Their spread over a large area is a huge constraint. Further, some political parties pay money (which is illegal) for women domestic workers to attend rallies. This weakens the efforts of unions and NGOs [non-governmental organisations] to organise women domestic workers. Organising women domestic workers is necessary, but it requires of the Election Commissions that they monitor to ensure that electoral codes of conducts are not violated. Spaces to organise protest meetings are shrinking, and the time given by the authorities are inconvenient to domestic workers. EXPANDING THE SPACE TO ORGANISE - A POLITICAL MINIMUM - IS A MUST.
4. Lastly, women domestic workers are constrained by having to do both paid domestic work in the house of employers and unpaid domestic work at home. If they have daughters, they help out (at times also with paid domestic work). This does not easily permit coming to meetings of associations. Neither does it permit getting trained into a better paid job like nursing, plumbing, painting etc. THUS REDUCING THEIR WORK BURDEN through access to cooking gas, piped water at home, food processors, fridge etc is a must in the short run. Equally, SOCIAL MINIMUM OF SENSITISING MALE RELATIVES OF DOMESTIC WORKERS is necessary.

The domestic workers normally swim in the economic, social and political bowl with small amount of water (just to keep them alive), while the employers swim in the bowl with larger quantity of water - and accumulate more water due to the hard work of women domestic workers enabling them to use their education and skills. Thus, the balance is titled on one side - towards the privileged employers. 

The state supports more heavily the employers in their relationship with workers. The website of Tamil Nadu police, Crime Prevention wing, India sums it up:

• Servant Verification:     The city police provide a free service to the public. Whenever you are engaging the services of Domestic Servants like Maid, Caretaker, Cook, Driver, Office Boy or Watchman you can approach the local station for verifying their antecedents …(TN Police, n.d)

There is no service offered to help women or men domestic workers to check the antecedents of the employer or to register with the labour welfare board for getting social security, which is a laborious process.

    
References: 
International Labour Organisation, n.da, C189 - Domestic Workers Convention, 2011 (No. 189)

International Labour Organisation, n.db, Ratifications of C189 - Domestic Workers Convention, 2011 (No. 189)

Tamil Nadu Police, n.d Crime Prevention - Tips