I refer to the letter headlined, 'Foreign domestic helpers enjoying unfair advantage' (Sunday Morning Post, December 10). The letter opened with a laudatory reference to the Mandatory Provident Fund, but failed to explain any connection between that and a later recommendation that the Government should set up minimum wage guidelines for local people, or else abolish the minimum wage and guaranteed holiday benefits given to foreign domestic helpers. Your correspondent is apparently unaware that holiday benefits (if indeed that is an apt description) provided for in the Employment Ordinance do not discriminate between local workers and foreign workers. As to the minimum wage, it is imposed upon employers of foreign domestic helpers by administrative means which can be applied only through immigration control which cannot apply in the case of resident employees. Of course the very idea is inconsistent with the free-market principles which have contributed to Hong Kong's economic success, but so far as I know the minimum wage was introduced as much for the protection of local amahs as for any other purpose. So far as a minimum wage for foreign helpers may still be justified, it is arguably now higher than it need to achieve its purpose. There is little doubt that at its present level it puts far more money into the pockets of rapacious employment agencies than they deserve. If your correspondent wants the Government to do something, why not start there? DAVID PYOTT Kennedy Town