Victimised foreign helpers face uphill struggle when seeking justice

Your articles concerning injustices to overseas domestic helpers ('Maids get raw deal in labour tribunal', and 'Helper's wages case drags on after eight months', August 5) should be observed and action taken on behalf of the maids.

Many of them are considering leaving Hong Kong to find justice elsewhere. Although we have a department to deal with racial prejudice, such prejudice still exists.

Not all employers are unjust, but far too many still are. I have reported a number of cases, but after a few government promises, nothing has been done. Let me mention a few examples. There are rules for the protection of maids who are physically or mentally threatened. Those maids who know the facts will seldom report even serious assaults, because they know that they will have to wait months, or even more than a year for the case to be heard in court, during which time they are not permitted to find another job.

The accused employer, however, is allowed to engage another helper.

The maid is not called upon to make a statement if she has a lawyer. I recall one case where the helper was granted legal aid, but in court she could have made out a better defence herself, because the lawyer presented her case so badly. The court supposedly reduced her sentence, but ordered her to be returned at once to her place of birth, thus depriving her of appeal to the Court of Final Appeal, as she had intended to do.

I know of several employers who deliberately misinterpret 'minimum wage' as 'maximum wage'.