SIPTU: Ireland plagued by abuse of migrant workers
Ireland’s economy has been plagued by an ugly underbelly of abuse of migrant workers’ rights, it was claimed today.
Rosheen Callender, SIPTU national equality secretary, said employers, trade unionists and law makers had a role to play in cleaning up society.
“It is totally unacceptable that migrant workers should be subjected to the kind of exploitation, abuse and humiliation that is now at last beginning to be widely reported and noticed,” she said.
“We have consistently pointed out that the Celtic Tiger has an ugly underbelly which Irish society needs to examine closely, and we need to clean up our act.”
Ms Callender said SIPTU had been fighting for years for reform of immigration policies and work permit arrangements, and for the effective enforcement of labour laws on working time, minimum pay and conditions.
“We need these reforms urgently and we need them for positive, humanitarian and egalitarian reasons,” she said.
“I find it distasteful to hear people arguing for better treatment of migrant workers for purely economic reasons, as if it were just a matter of unfair competition, when employers try to undercut each other by paying lower wages to certain workers.”
Ms Callender told the union’s National Women’s Forum in Kerry that there was an ambivalence as to whether young mothers should work outside the home.
But she questioned why it was acceptable for migrant women workers to be separated from their children for a few hours a day, and on occasions for months or even years on end.
“The unspoken assumption of many employers, economists and law and policy-makers is that one of the factors that makes immigrant labour cheaper is that many of the so-called extra labour costs, like childcare, pensions and even minimum pay, can be avoided,” she said.
The union leader warned it was unacceptable for society to have double-standards for migrant workers because they were working away from home and open to abuse.
She said SIPTU was appealing to all trade unionists and Irish society as a whole, to take a positive and humane approach to the needs of migrant workers and not treat them as mere cogs in an economic machine.
Ms Callender said: “SIPTU officials and activists already have a good track record of work and solidarity with migrant workers and we are more determined than ever to continue and increase this and secure full equality for all migrant workers in our midst.”
