|
|
Post by dodger on Sept 2, 2013 6:20:25 GMT
www.workers.org.uk/opinion/opinion_0613/inflexible.htmlLet's start being inflexibleWORKERS, JUN 2013 ISSUELabour mobility sounds much better than labour immobility – who wants to be immobile? Just as labour flexibility sounds much better than labour inflexibility – who wants to be inflexible? But both are bad for us.Who backs labour mobility? The World Bank, which tells us we must end “constraints on labour mobility”. The International Monetary Fund. The European Union. The European Roundtable of Industrialists. The Confederation of British Industry.The employing class wants labour mobility. It wants no restraints whatsoever on its activities. Labour mobility is part of the neo-liberal consensus that has plunged us into this second great depression.Karl Marx was right. In a address from the First International in 1867, he wrote, “A study of the struggle waged by the English working class reveals that, in order to oppose their workers, the employers either bring in workers from abroad or else transfer manufacture to countries where there is a cheap labour force.”Unions representing for example lecturers, teachers and journalists all too often back labour mobility. Some even talk about the “right” to work in other countries.Workers in these unions should reflect. One material condition of their work – an excellent command of English – offers an element of protection unavailable to most workers (although the recent widespread outsourcing of, for example, editing work to India should prompt a pause for thought). Those in agriculture or building who oppose labour mobility do so not out of stupidity or prejudice but because immigrants from Eastern Europe directly compete with them for scarce jobs. ■
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Sept 2, 2013 9:17:52 GMT
www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/majority-of-voters-think-immigration-is-harming-britain-8793233.htmlWell that is a slap in the face for ultra-leftists who presume to tell us what is good for us. Unless you are prepared to class the overwhelming majority of British workers as somehow fascist or racist, a need to address legitimate concern. The willfully bigoted liberals unwilling to silence their mantra calls for open borders, even under a hail of scorn are ignored. Those who wish to dance around the Totem Pole issuing bloodcurdling shrieks of anti-immigrant racist, BNP, Daily Mail reader, are bigoterds. I've come across. from a decade ago ideas percolating, debated, one of many contributions below. Congratulations the ultra-left, in alliance with global finance, have made themselves even more irrelevant--if that was possible.
.................................................................................................................................................................................
Fine coverage of important issue, 15 July 2003
By William Podmore
This review is from: OverCrowded Britain: Our Immigration Crisis Exposed (Paperback)Ashley Mote has written a very useful book on immigration. He notes that Jack Straw says that all 75 million new EU citizens from Eastern Europe can work in Britain from January. As unemployment there averages 16%, and wages are 12% of ours, many may accept his generous invitation!But Britain is already overcrowded, especially in the South East. Our 60 million people are 641 to a square mile, compared with 269 in France and 76 in the USA.By the Single European Act, signed by Thatcher, Britain had to end its border controls with the EU. We have now been accepting about 250,000 immigrants a year since 1997, yet are not short of labour: we have four million unemployed. Dependence on immigration deters education, depresses wages, and aids the employer.The Civitas report, Do we need mass immigration?, observed, “Current immigration increases inequalities in the UK, because it causes a massive redistribution of wealth from those who compete with immigrants in the labour market – who tend to be poor, and suffer low wages – to those who employ them who tend to be ‘rich’.”As an AEU representative said in 1947 of similar debates, “We resent also the decisions made in our name and without our agreement on ‘displaced persons’, and we reject the philosophy that if a job is so badly paid that no British worker will work at it, then the only alternative is foreign labour. We must fight for improved conditions in these industries.”The UN High Commission for Refugees noted in 2002 that more asylum seekers tried for Britain than for any other country in the Western world. Australia halved the number of applicants by denying entry to all without the right documents, deporting unauthorised arrivals and offering cash incentives to those willing to return home. We could do the same.For many good reasons then, the majority of British people oppose mass immigration. Yet some sneer ‘racialist’ at anyone proposing immigration controls. But, as Mote shows, uncontrolled immigration harms other countries by robbing them of their labour power, and harms Britain by worsening our conditions.
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Sept 3, 2013 14:28:21 GMT
Brilliant study of Britain's capital city, 13 Nov 2008
By William Podmore
This review is from: World City (Paperback)
Doreen Massey, Professor of Geography at the Open University, has written a brilliant study of London. It is a city of workers, and still of manufacturing industry, claimed by a minority for finance capital.
London's economy is still closely tied into Britain's economy. London's main export market is not abroad, but the rest of Britain: 28.5% of all London's exports go to the rest of Britain, 12.33% go abroad; 39.88% of financial services go to the rest of Britain, 31.46% abroad; and 32.89% of business services go to the rest of Britain, just 12.08% abroad.
Yet the City of London is a key base of class power, of command and control, where finance capital rules. The City's dominance was a class victory for Thatcherism, and has led to growing exploitation and so to growing inequality and poverty both here and abroad. As Massey writes, `a new imperial order has taken hold'.
The Labour government embraced the Thatcher counter-revolution and spread it to the regions, trying to incorporate the whole of Britain into Thatcherism, by urging the regions to embrace finance, destroy industry and compete to attract capital and labour. So the Treasury blames regional inequality on regions' `market failures', not on the failure of the whole market model.
Finance capital demands the free movement of capital and labour. So in 2004, the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry welcomed the increased immigration into London from the new EU members. Later, governor of the Bank of England Mervyn King admitted, "Without this influx to fill the skills gap in a tight labour market it is likely that earnings would have risen at a faster rate." Massey too notes immigration's `depressive effect on wages at the lower end'.
She also points out that commitment to immigration conflicts with commitment to equality between nations, writing, "Unrestricted immigration can result in increased inequality between countries." Immigrant workers, for instance nurses from Ghana, are subsidising London, `a perverse subsidy, flowing from poor to rich'. Voices from the South, including Nelson Mandela, have called for these flows of labour to be constrained or stopped.
`London-as-global-city' is hospitable both to immigration and to finance capital. But London as Britain's capital city needs neither immigration nor finance capital; it needs to be first and foremost a city for Britain
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Sept 7, 2013 6:27:51 GMT
migration and power
WORKERS, SEPT 2005 ISSUE
Speaking in Bradford in June, the Governor of the Bank of England, Mervyn King, said, "Immigration has reduced wage inflation:...If the increased demand for labour generates its own supply in the form of migrant labour then the link between demand and prices is broken...Indeed, in an economy that can call on unlimited supplies of migrant labour, the concept of output gap is meaningless...the inflow of migrant labour, especially in the past year or so from Eastern Europe, has probably led to a diminution of inflationary pressure on the labour market...Without this influx to fill the skill gaps in a tight labour market, it is likely earnings would have risen at a faster rate, putting upward pressure on the costs of employers."
In other words, cheap mass labour from Eastern Europe — the Polish Plumber syndrome — has been used to keep wages stagnant or reduce them. The real purpose of immigration is revealed for what it is: to undermine the wages of British workers.
Anyone who wants a practical example of this need look no further than Heathrow. The workers at Gate Gourmet (see page 3) were just too expensive, and, even more important, too highly unionised for this spin-off of British Airways, itself a product of privatisation. Destroying the union is essential to the project.
The plan is to hire new workers from Eastern Europe at £6 an hour — not a proper living wage, and one that will require the taxpayer to subsidise families dependent on it via the tax credit system. The European Union tells us we cannot subsidise industry to keep it going, but it seems that there's unlimited money to subsidise union-busting and drive down wages and conditions.
Could this have happened anywhere else in the EU? Well, perhaps not yet. Because apart from Ireland only Britain — courtesy of Jack Straw and the Labour government — decided to give unrestricted access almost immediately, from 1 May 2004, to workers from the new Eastern European members even though transitional arrangements allowed restrictions for up to seven years. At a stroke, Labour solved most of the problem of illegal immigration...by making it legal!
There should be no doubt about what the aim of this open-door immigration policy is. It is to reduce wages and conditions to the world minimum. Think about it: we are constantly told we will have to reduce our expectations, and our wages, if we are to compete with China. But wages in Britain are 20 times those in urban China — and 30 times the Chinese rural wage. The inexorable logic is that unless we suffer wage cuts of 95%, we're "costing too much".
In that regard, cheap Polish or Lithuanian labour is just a halfway house for capitalism. And already their wages are too high — as the article on page 5 of this issue ("Last Scottish yard under threat") shows, Polish shipyards are using even cheaper Russian labour to undercut Scottish yards.
For too long some in the trade unions have taken a liberal attitude to immigration, so afraidof charges of racism that they have allowed Labour to operate a deliberate policy of weakening workers' bargaining power on a massive scale. Perhaps those in favour of unlimited immigration could explain what is anti-racist about a policy that leads directly to the sacking of hundreds of British women of Indian origin.
In the face of the Bank of England, the Labour government and the European Union, we in Britain will survive only by asserting our class interests. The working class — of every country — must exercise control over the supply of labour.
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Sept 15, 2013 7:41:54 GMT
Gov’t contradicts itself on “more OFWs coming home” with K to 12 labor export goal
Posted by admin on 6/10/13 • Categorized as News ReleasesMigrante International today chided the Aquino administration for contradicting itself on claims of supposed improved local job generation when its K to 12 education program is geared mainly towards exporting labor for the global market.
 Recently, Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) Sec. Rosalinda Baldoz released a statement claiming that more overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) are opting to come home because of the GDP growth resulting in more jobs and opportunities available at home.According to Garry Martinez, Migrante International chairperson, “The Aquino government’s claims are baseless, if not utterly false and deliberately deceiving. How can the Aquino government declare better opportunities for OFWs here at home when it has further tailored the public education system for a more aggressive labor export program? The K to 12 means more OFW deployment abroad and the Aquino government is starting them young.”
Martinez said that the K to 12 program is aimed mainly to reinforce cheap semi-skilled youth labor for the global market.He said that “the real motive behind the K to 12 education system is the intensification of labor export, this time systematically targeting the country’s young labor force.”The Department of Education says that the K to 12 system “will improve chances of youth employment” and that it will ensure that 18-year-old graduates will be “employable even without a college degree.”Martinez said that the DepEd plans to achieve this through a so-called “specialized Senior High program” that focuses on a curriculum that will “enable students to acquire Certificates of Competency (COCs) and National Certifications (NCs)…in accordance with TESDA Training Regulations.”“These certificates, without doubt, will be in compliance with requirements for overseas deployment. Not much different, for example, with the Arroyo administration’s TESDA-accredited ‘Supermaids’ program.”“What the K to 12 system is doing is boosting cheap semi-skilled youth labor. The DepEd talks of a so-called ‘professionalization’ of the young labor force mainly in labor markets abroad but unfortunately continues to ignore the very causes of forced migration, namely, lack of local jobs, low wages, landlessness and poor social services,” said Martinez.He said that the K to 12 system sadly undermines the youth’s very significant role in nation-building because it is geared towards providing cheap semi-skilled youth labor to the global market instead of for domestic development.“Young workers, mostly semi-skilled, make up approximately 10.7 percent of the total Filipino labor migration population. Through the K to 12, the Aquino government will further program our youth not to serve the country but to service the needs of the neoliberal global market.”
“The K to 12 program means more, not less, OFWs, younger and more trained to be docile, cheap laborers abroad,” Martinez said. ###>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>> Now could this be spelled out any clearer? Migration is a class issue. 4,000 each and every day leave the Philippines. To join the Piranha Pool, that is the Labour market, in countries with chronic unemployment. Adding to the reserve army of labour. The above article written in sober, down to earth language, deserves a deep reflection and a response. People in Britain have already voiced their opinions on the matter of mass immigration. Stealing skilled workers from developing countries, clearly a ploy to cut costs of training in host countries. Cheapen the price of labour. The extreme 'left' and their mirror image on the right, both race obsessed, have contributed to confusion. Communists- trade unionists need to take responsibility thrash out the issues. We can see the results of Golden Dawn and suchlike being left to create mischief and mayhem. |
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Sept 26, 2013 15:23:29 GMT
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Sept 29, 2013 10:07:14 GMT
November 2013
"Free movement of labour: modern day slavery"
Tuesday 12 November, 7.30pm
Conway Hall, Red Lion Square, London WC1R 4RL
CPBML public meeting. Free movement of labour is one of the cornerstones of the European Union.
And it's a dagger aimed at the labour movement's heart. Come and discuss. Everybody welcome.
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Oct 7, 2013 22:56:13 GMT
Filipino migrants’ rights advocates join high level talks on migration“Large scale migration is a symptom of underdevelopment in the sending country. The structural causes of underdevelopment driving migration and exposing migrants to vulnerable situations must be addressed.” – Migrante InternationalBy JANESS ANN J. ELLAOBulatlat.comMANILA – Filipino migrant rights advocates are joining this year’s International Assembly of Migrants and Refugees, a parallel event to the United Nation’s High Level Dialogue on Migration and Development, to call for an end to the Global Forum on Migration and Development and bury the notion that migration will lead to genuine development.Since 2008, the International Assembly of Migrants and Refugees (IAMR) has been gathering grassroots migrant organizations who seek to “expose the bankruptcy of the United Nation’s line of ‘managing migration’ as a tool for development.” The event, which will take place parallel to the United Nation’s High Level Dialogue on International Migration and Development on Oct. 3 to 4, will discuss issues affecting migrants and propose solutions to end forced migration.In a statement, Migrante International said that it will present the Philippine situation to the IAMR as an example of how migration did not lead to genuine development.“Large scale migration is a symptom of underdevelopment in the sending country. The structural causes of underdevelopment driving migration and exposing migrants to vulnerable situations must be addressed,” the group said.“The global economic system has led to the commodification of labour as well as goods; and current neoliberal policies underpinning the prevailing economic order has driven the movement of peoples and goods from developing to developed countries. The Philippines is one example within a broader context of labour commodification and exploitation on an international level,” the group added.Migrante International chairperson Garry Martinez is currently in New York to attend the IAMR.Not a tool for developmentDuring the first High Level Dialogue on Migration and Development in 2006, Migrante International said there has been global recognition that migration will benefit both migrant-sending and migrant-receiving countries through remittances these migrants will send back home and the cheap labor they offer, respectively.“Because of this, no less than the United Nations has peddled the notion that migration leads to development and a country only needs to ‘manage’ migration to reap its benefits. Currently, remittances rank only second to foreign direct investments and are fast outpacing the rate of official development aid (World Bank 2011),” Migrante International said.This has subsequently led to the formation of the Global Forum on Migration and Development, which aims to “facilitate dialogue between governments on migration for development.”Migrante International said while the GFMD is mandated to promote the protection of migrant rights, the International Migrants Tribunal found out in Nov. 2012 that its policies have focused more on managing the economic potential of remittances. It has also pushed for migration policies for all related branches of government, which migrant rights advocates believe, will only serve the purpose of developed countries who will then receive workers from underdeveloped countries who are willing to do dirty, dangerous and difficult jobs or the “3D jobs.”The Philippines, for one, is one of the largest sending countries of migrant workers, with some 1.5 million Filipinos leaving every year. And while it has managed to institutionalize and manage migration, “decades of exporting cheap Filipino labour have not led to any genuine development: the Philippines is still an underdeveloped Third World country,” according to Migrante International.“Overseas Filipino Workers (OFWs) continue to experience physical, sexual, psychological abuse, are exploited, trafficked and discriminated against. Their families at home suffer the social burden while the Philippines experiences an unrelenting brain drain,” the group added.World Bank data shows that the Philippines is the fourth biggest remittance receiving country next to India, China and Mexico. Remittances, according to International Fund for Agricultural Development, make up 12.5 percent of the country’s Gross Domestic Product. But Migrante International noted that “there has been no ‘trickle down’ to the people at the bottom” and that 40 years of labor export policy did not result in the Philippines developing a sustainable local industry.“Remittances have not been proven as a motor for development in the Philippines. In fact, inequality is as deeply entrenched as before. Economic growth in the Philippines has not translated to economic relief for the people. The income of the top one percent of families in the Philippines is equivalent to that of the bottom 30 percent of households, according to IBON Foundation,” Migrante International said.The unemployment rate in the country, according a March 2013 Social Weather Station survey, is at 27.2 percent. Ibon Foundation, in 2012, estimated that there were 4.4 million unemployed and 7.5 underemployed Filipinos.“The lack of development of the economy, resulting in high unemployment and low wages, means that Filipinos are trapped in cycles of migration generation after generation with no long term solution. ‘Human capital investment’ cited as a positive effect of migration is meaningless if children educated from remittances are unable to find work at home when they graduate,” Migrante International said.Migrante International believes that the Philippines has also suffered socially from migration. “Families experience social conflict and children are vulnerable without close supervision and support from parents. An estimated 6 million children in the Philippines are growing up with at least one absent parent which has been shown to affect children’s emotional and psychological well being (UNICEF).”Milking cowsAside from benefiting from the remittances, the Philippine government, according to Migrante International, has also increased fees paid by Filipinos in order to secure permits, documentary requirements, among others to get work abroad.“Each OFW has to pay at least P25,367 ($587) in fees before they are allowed to leave the country. From the 1,802,031 OFWs who left the Philippines in 2012, the Philippine government earned nearly P45.7 billion ($1.06 billion) from these state exactions,” the group said.There are, however, hardly services to the hailed modern heroes of the Philippine government.Migrante International said that in 2012, only 0.17 percent of the national budget was allocated to services for OFWs while the government reportedly received $23.8 billion in remittances.During the last High Level Dialogue on Migration and Development, Migrante International said the Philippine government “boasted of having a Rapid Response Team to repatriate OFWs in time of crisis.” But the group said the recent crackdown on undocumented workers in Saudi Arabia showed how poor the services are for Filipino migrant workers. Some 4,500 Filipinos who wanted to be repatriated camped outside the Philippine embassy and consulate in Riyadh and Jeddah, respectively.The group said few and slow repatriation also awaited Filipinos who were caught in strife-torn Libya in 2011, among other crises and uprisings that recently happened in Middle East countries.Services for Filipino migrant workers in distress were all the more marred with the recently-exposed sex-for-flight scheme, where embassy officials reportedly offered “part-time jobs” to Filipino women workers so they could buy tickets to go home.“The sex-for-flight scandal is not an isolated issue but rather an added example of the vulnerability of OFWs and abuse they are subjected to abroad,” Migrante International said.Exploitative working conditionsMigrante International said that while the Philippine government prided itself in signing formal and informal agreements with migrant-receiving countries to supposedly protect the welfare of Filipino workers, “many agreements have been made with receiving countries only to facilitate the sending of more OFWs as cheap labour. The government has not ensured that those states meet their obligations to protect the basic human rights of OFWs. OFWs are frequently exploited and abused – physically, sexually and emotionally.”The Philippine government, for one, continues to send Filipino workers to Saudi Arabia despite its skafala or sponsorship system, which even international organization Human Rights Watch scored for being anti-migrant. Human Rights Watch said the sponsorship system do not allow workers in abusive situations to easily change their jobs because their residency permits are bound to their employers, their sponsors.“Employers often abuse this power to confiscate passports, withhold wages and force migrant workers into slave-like conditions. In effect, the kafala makes migrant workers more vulnerable to abuses and modern-day slavery,” Migrante International said.Aside from this, there have been steady number of cases of Filipino migrant workers not getting the full promised wages once they reach their workplaces abroad, denied of day-offs, and even high rates of physical, sexual and emotional abuse.The government’s aggressive promotion of migration, Migrante International said, has proliferated cases of human trafficking. While there is an estimated 300,000 to 400,000 Filipinos who have been trafficked, the migrants rights group said there were only 25 convictions for human trafficking last year.AlternativesMigrante International challenged the High Level Dialogue on Migration and Development to focus its resources to ensuring that human rights of migrant workers are upheld and to promote sustainable development policies in migrant-sending countries“Migration should not be treated as a tool for development but rather as a development concern which should be addressed in the post-2015 agenda. Migration, as a choice or an obligation for family survival, should serve as a measure to see whether development goals are working,” the migrant rights group said.They also urged the United Nations to open their forums to grassroots migrant organizations just as the International Labor Organization has opened its doors for trade unions.In the Philippines, members of Migrante International danced in solidarity with the Millions of Migrants Mobilizing Worldwide (3MW) on Oct. 3 at the Liwasang Bonifacio in Manila. The 3MW, the main event held at Washington Square Park in New York City at 2:14 p.m. on Oct. 3, is a global cultural campaign consisting of a choreographed line dance that depicts issues migrants are facing around the world.Mic Catuira, spokesperson for Migrante International, said, “Today, we dance in solidarity with migrant workers all over the world to end modern-day slavery. Today, we dance with OFWs all over the world in continuing protest against a corrupt, anti-people and anti-migrant government that has treated OFWs as milking cows for patronage politics and the interests of a few. Today, we dance with millions of Filipino modern-day heroes in the call to abolish the pork barrel system and for greater state subsidy for social services, including direct services for OFWs in distress.” (http://bulatlat.com)- See more at: bulatlat.com/main/2013/10/07/filipino-migrants-rights-advocates-join-high-level-talks-on-migration/#sthash.hQr20ScQ.dpuf>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>In evidence to the House of Lords EU home affairs sub committee Peter Sutherland, Head of the Global Forum on Migration and Development, said the European Union should be doing its best to undermine the sense of homogeneity (single identity) of its member countries in favour of an open immigration policy.Sutherland is also non-executive chairman of Goldman Sachs International and former chairman of BP, and has reportedly attended meetings of the Bilderberg Group. He admitted that the Global Forum on Migration and Development had received some funding from the British government. There are still those on the Left who give unstinting support to Mass migration and Social Dumping. Open Borders too. Small wonder they are despised by workers. Both in host and sending countries.
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Oct 12, 2013 1:07:45 GMT
 OCTOBER 9, 2013 Stranded OFW dies in Tent CityLouie Bedaho Belista, 36, who died due to a severe asthma attack, was the sixth person to die at the Tent City in Jeddah.
By JANESS ANN J. ELLAO
Bulatlat.com
MANILA — A stranded overseas Filipino worker who sought refuge at the Tent City in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia died due to asthma attack on Oct. 6, Migrante Middle East and North Africa reported.
“He was the sixth person to die at the Tent City in Jeddah,” John Monterona, Migrante Middle East and North Africa, said in a statement.
Louie Bedaho Belista, 36, died in the tent city in Jeddah around 11:30 p.m., according to Marlon Gatdula, chairperson of Migrante-Jeddah. He added that Belista, a nurse, was also helping treat fellow Filipinos who are sick.
Belista is among the thousands of stranded overseas Filipino workers are seeking refuge at tent cities in Riyadh and in Jeddah in front of the Philippine embassy and consulate, respectively, due to the implementation of the Nitaqat Scheme, a labor policy that requires Saudi companies to hire Saudi nationals to comprise at least 10 percent of their total workforce.
The said policy has resulted to crackdowns on undocumented workers, most of them have escaped their employers due to poor working conditions, and, at times, sexual abuses.
The Saudi government has moved the deadline to November 3 for all undocumented workers to be repatriated.
In Jeddah alone, there are 400 stranded Filipinos who have asked Philippine consulate officials to process their repatriation.
Monterona said they are have repeatedly warned the Philippine government and its consulate in Jeddah to fast track the repatriation, especially those with children, women, the old and sick.
Gatdula said Belista was confined twice in a hospital but he did not receive proper medication nor assistance from the Philippine government. His remains lies at the King Fahad Hospital morgue and that his family back in Nueva Vizcaya has already been informed by one of the officials of Migrante.
“Prior to his death, Mr. Belista sought assistance from Migrante after he complained that he did not receive medical assistance from Philippine consulate and labor officials,” Gatdula said.
Sixth to die
Migrante Middle East and North Africa said in a statement that Belista is the sixth person to die in the tent city. Of the reported five deaths prior to Belista, Monterona said, the Philippine government only confirmed three cases.
Monterona said more cases of Filipinos getting sick, or worse dying, in tent cities could happen if the government will not provide medical assistance and urgently process their immediate repatriation. He added that President Aquino should be held accountable for the deaths of the six Filipinos who died while waiting for repatriation.
He said, “the Aquino administration, like the previous regime, is not providing social services and on-site protection for overseas Filipino workers. Billions of pesos are being pocketed by politicians while there are hardly funds allocated for the welfare and protection of OFWs.” (http://bulatlat.com) - See more at: bulatlat.com/main/2013/10/09/stranded-ofw-dies-in-tent-city/#sthash.7WBCUZdR.dpuf |
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Oct 16, 2013 14:25:32 GMT
Tales of OFWs belie claims of ‘reverse migration’ “If what the government has been saying is true, why am I applying again? Why is there a steady stream of Filipinos leaving the country to work abroad every day?” – OFWBy JANESS ANN J. ELLAO Bulatlat.com MANILA – Gil Lebria, 37, an overseas Filipino worker, was victimized abroad thrice. He has experienced contract substitution, being paid a salary lower than what was stipulated in the contract, unfair labor practices, among others, and yet he kept applying for work abroad. The last time he was in distress abroad was 2011 — when he was working in the strife-torn Libya and was eventually repatriated by the Philippine government.
After returning from Libya, Lebria was hopeful about finding a job here in the country. But two years later, he found none. Lebria went back to his province in Davao Oriental to help his family farm. But their small income could not sustain their needs and pay for the debts his family incurred to pay for his previous placement fees.
“I was afraid to lose the small land that my family has been tilling to loan sharks. I needed to pay the $4,878 debt my family incurred for my placement fees and the hospitalization of my late mother,” Lebria said.
Lebria is now in Manila, applying for a job abroad. He is hoping to land a job in Libya or in Sudan, where, he said, situation maybe a bit more risky but has better labor practices compared to Middle East countries. He is disappointed that despite the promise of the Department of Labor and Employment in 2011 that the government is ready to accommodate and provide reintegration programs for Filipinos returning from strife-torn Libya, he is forced to once again leave the country and find work abroad.
In 2011, Labor Secretary Rosalinda Baldoz said that, “even before the crisis in Libya erupted, the (National Reintegration Center for OFWs) has already established various reintegration programs for OFWs.”
Baldoz added that several institutions such as the Joint Foreign Chambers of the Philippines and the Federation of Filipino Chinese Chambers of Commerce and Industry Inc. “have expressed their desire to hire OFW evacuees from Libya who match the available vacancies in their member-firms.”
Two years later, Baldoz claimed that overseas Filipino workers are now returning to the country to find more lucrative jobs here. The “new trend,” she said, is mainly due to the growing tourism and entertainment industry, particularly a gaming complex in Pasay City.
“I think we are seeing a rise in the entertainment industry, within that sector… we are seeing a reverse migration because of the high-end quality jobs being offered by these firms,” Baldoz was quoted as saying in a Philippine Daily Inquirer report.
But Lebria disagrees. “If what the government has been saying is true, why am I applying again. Why is there a steady stream of Filipinos leaving the country to work abroad every day?”
Finding work
For two years, Lebria said he tried his best to find work here in the country. “DOLE promised that we would be prioritized for jobs here. So I tried but failed,” he told Bulatlat.com.
“I attended job fairs here and there. But there was an age limit, which is 35 years old. I even applied as a construction worker but they think I am already too old. Now, I am about to turn 38 and I doubt if I could still find work here,” he said.
Others, he said, who were able to find work here only got a five-month contract. “Contractualization is so rampant here and each contract only lasts for about five months unlike in other countries where one at least gets a two-year contract,” Lebria said.
Salary too, he added, is too low. “It can hardly support my family in the province. How much more now that I need to pay the debt we incurred for my previous placement fees?”
Ibon Foundation, an independent think tank organization, said underemployment and unemployment have increased by more than a million under President Aquino’s three-year-administration.
“There were 11.884 million unemployed and underemployed Filipinos in April 2013 compared to 10.877 million in April 2010, or a 1.008 million increase in the last three years of increasingly rapid growth,” Ibon said, “Ibon estimates that the real unemployment rate in April is 10.9%, the highest in the last three years, on top of an underemployment rate of 19.2% which remains markedly higher than the 15.6% reported in the same period a decade ago in 2003.”
From Malaysia
Maricon Evanchez, 30, said she left the country on Aug. 16 2012 hoping to give her family a brighter future. She got a job as a domestic helper in Malaysia, where she was promised to earn $380 a month.
“It has always been my dream to own a house. We are living with my parents,” Evanchez said, adding that when the opportunity came, she did not think twice.
Evanchez said she was supposed to accept a job offer from Dubai. But the salary, which was only $198, was too low, she added. When she arrived in Malaysia, she only received $309. On top of the smaller salary she was getting, she told Bulatlat.com that her employer did not give her ample time to rest.
She only lasted one week with her first employer.
Three weeks later, Evanchez got another job in Malaysia. This time, she was assigned to take care of her employer’s old father. Her agency deducted two and a half months’ worth of salary during her five-month stay with her new employer. On Feb. 5, shortly after the death of her employer’s father, she was sent back to her agency.
“I was supposed to accept another job. But later on, I found out from a fellow Filipino worker that the deduction the agency took from my salary was unnecessary. I felt betrayed and decided to go home,” Evanchez said.
Her agency’s employees took her cellphone and money. “The only favor I asked from them is to get a chance to call my family. They were expecting me to send money and I do not want them to be worried.”
Though they had air conditioning and were given food, Evanchez said, she felt bad that they were put behind bars as if they were criminals. “We were not allowed to go out,” she added.
On March 8, Evanchez’ finally arrived in Manila. While she was happy to be home, “in a place where Filipinos cannot be stripped of their rights,” reality also started to sink in. She is not an inch closer to achieving the dreams she wanted for her family.
Evanchez then applied for the reintegration program being offered by the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration. She hoped to get $238 to fund her store back in the province. OWWA provided her a one-day training on running a business.
“I just need to pass one or two documents to OWWA’s office in Calamba. After that, I would need to wait four to six months to get the $238,” she said, adding that she found it “too long.”
For SONA
Evanchez, while waiting for the reintegration package of OWWA, said she is also applying for a job abroad. She recently applied as a domestic helper in Saudi Arabia.
When asked if she is not worried about her safety, especially with news about the unfair labor practices rampant in the Middle East, she said that, “working abroad is also about luck. If you are lucky, things would turn better for you.”
Taking the risk of finding that “luck,” she said, is way better than working here in the country. “Here one needs to have good connections to find a good job. What will happen to us who do not have work experience and did not finish schooling?”
“Worse, the rampant contractualization only gives us five months of work. After that, you have to find another,” Evanchez said.
Lebria, for his part, said all these talk about reverse migration is just part of the Aquino administration’s ploy to deceive the Filipino people about the “inclusive growth” that the country is supposedly pursuing.
He said, “I have done all possible work I can get into. The salary here is not enough to give our families a decent life. We only earn for these companies to grow while the workers are getting poorer.” (http://bulatlat.com) - See more at: bulatlat.com/main/2013/06/28/tales-of-ofws-belie-claims-of-reverse-migration/#sthash.Dbv0Xy9T.dpuf
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Oct 21, 2013 1:56:17 GMT
www.globalslaveryindex.org/media/This is the first edition of the Global Slavery Index produced by the Walk Free Foundation and its partners. It is the first Index of its kind – providing an estimate, country by country, of the number of people living in modern slavery today.
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Oct 29, 2013 17:07:54 GMT
Migrant's tale.....
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Oct 31, 2013 1:56:20 GMT
Useful survey of the debate about migration, 29 Oct 2013
This William Podmore review is from: The Migration Debate (Policy and Politics in the Twenty-First Century Series) (Paperback)
Sarah Spencer is Deputy Director at the Centre on Migration, Policy and Society at the University of Oxford. This is a useful introduction to the debate about migration.
As the author acknowledges, "With EU membership, however, comes non-negotiable free movement of EU citizens to work in Britain."
In 2010, 586,000 people came to Britain to live here for more than a year, the usual level since 2004. 239,000 were allowed to settle here. Irregular migrants are estimated at 783,000, fostered by employers who break employment law. Between 2000 and 2009, there were 1.9 million net immigrants.
The employers gain by having a larger supply of cheaper labour, but "the benefits to employers do not necessarily equate to benefits for all." Spending cuts press local authority employers to employ cheap (immigrant) labour. Investment in skills training, and better wages and conditions, would cut the demand for migrant workers.
Immigration is asset-stripping - taking from poorer countries their younger, more educated and skilled people. The 2001 Code of Practice for the Active Recruitment of Healthcare Professionals is voluntary for the private sector, allowing poaching.
83 per cent of us want less migration, raising the issue of power - who decides? Us, or the EU for us? We need a referendum ASAP, so that we can leave the EU ASAP.
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Oct 31, 2013 2:01:24 GMT
Useful study of migration and movement in the EU, 29 Oct 2013
This Will Podmore review is from: Migration and Mobility in the European Union (The European Union Series) (Paperback)
Christina Boswell is Senior Lecturer in Politics at the University of Edinburgh and Andrew Geddes is Professor of Politics at the University of Sheffield. They have written a very informative study of migration and mobility in the European Union.
At least five million people have left Eastern Europe's countries, whose economies were shattered by counter-revolutions and capitalist crises. By 2010 Germany had 10.8 million migrants, France 6.7 million, and Britain 6.5 million.
In 2004 the Labour government gave immediate labour market access to the nationals of the eight new central and eastern European EU members, supposedly to expand `selective migration'. Orthodox economists chorused that this would grow the economy. The Home Office said 5,000-13,000 would come. In fact, it brought the biggest wave of immigration in British history. In the next four years the government approved 928,000 Worker Registration Scheme applications, including 613,000 Poles. 1.9 million people arrived between 2000 and 2009.
The 1957 Treaty of Rome, the EEC's founding treaty, laid down "the abolition, as between Member States, of obstacles to freedom of movement of persons, services and capital." The aim was and is to create a more flexible labour market. The authors acknowledge, "by signing up to free movement provisions, EU governments have ceded sovereign authority over the entry, residence and employment of nationals of other member states."
They point out that there is no positive right to family migration, to family reunification. The EU's misleadingly titled `Right to Family Reunification' Directive does not actually provide a right to family reunification.
The European Commission always pushes this line: in 1997 it produced its Action Plan for Free Movement of Workers; in 2002, an Action Plan for Skills and Mobility; in 2006 it had a `Year of Workers' Mobility'; and for 2007-10, a Job Mobility Action Plan.
But 83 per cent of us want less migration, raising the issue of power - who decides? Us, or the EU for us? We need a referendum ASAP, so that we can leave the EU ASAP.
|
|
|
|
Post by dodger on Oct 31, 2013 2:12:36 GMT
Interesting, informative account of migration's effects on EU member countries, 29 Oct 2013
ThisWill Podmore review is from: Europe's Immigration Challenge: Reconciling Work, Welfare and Mobility (Policy Network) (Paperback)
Elena Jurado is Senior Consultant at an international research consultancy, and Grete Brochmann is Professor of Sociology at the University of Oslo. This useful book, comprising ten contributions by experts from Britain, the USA, Norway, Denmark and Italy, discusses the economic impacts of immigration.
One popular claim is that we need migrants to save our welfare state - a claim that Gary Freeman rightly calls absurd. Are migrants supermen who don't get ill, don't need education or transport or housing, and don't get old?
The free movement of labour undermines comprehensive welfare states, trade unions, and collective action.
Between 2004 and 2007, an average of 650,000 people moved west out of Eastern Europe each year. Between 4 and 10 per cent of the populations of Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Poland had moved abroad by 2009 - five million from the eight new EU members. In the 2000s, the number of Poles working abroad rose from one million to 2.3 million in three years. Another 10 per cent of the population of the Baltic States have left since the economic collapse of 2008.
Belarus, by contrast, rejected capitalism, rejected the IMF and rejected the EU, so it enjoys full employment, free healthcare and free education. And so people come to it, rather than leave.
Rising numbers of people are fleeing the stricken South of Europe. One million left Spain alone in from early 2011 to mid-2012.
Foreign subcontractors, temp agencies and hiring companies employ millions of `posted workers' on subprime wages and conditions across Europe - including ten to fifteen per cent of the building workers in Britain. We have all too little labour-market regulation, no proper skills training, and hardly any apprenticeships. The wage floors applied to posted and migrant workers are well below the going rates in national industries. The European Court of Justice restricted posted workers' rights to a minimum and outlawed all attempts to improve them. So it is hard for our trade unions to organise these workers. So much for the EU social model!
For example, social care has low wages and poor working conditions. It is publicly funded, but provided by private firms and voluntary bodies, so spending cuts have led to chronic underinvestment. The cuts increase the demand for migrant workers. Privatisation here, as in general, leads to far less regulated markets, worse levels of service, lower wages and worse working conditions.
Employers use migrant workers to cut costs. Recruiting migrant workers entrenches low-cost, low-productivity work, preventing the development of more high-skill, high-technology production. Investment in skills training, and better wages and conditions, would cut the demand for migrant workers.
|
|
