‘Abused’ maid challenges Hong Kong law that forces her to live with employer
Lawyer says the legislation is unconstitutional and a danger to the basic rights of foreign helpers
A foreign domestic helper who claims to have suffered severe abuse at the hands of her employer has challenged the law requiring them to live with their hosts.
Daly and Associates, which is handling the landmark application for a judicial review, said the “live-in rule” heightened the risk of a breach in the helpers’ human, labour and economic rights and was unconstitutional under Article 39 of the Basic Law and Article 4 of the Hong Kong Bill of Rights.
These guaranteed both employer and employees privacy and the right to choose his or her residence.
It is a mandatory requirement for helpers to live and sleep at their place of employment.
Lawyer Mark Daly said it was “an important challenge to the mandatory live-in policy, which forces foreign domestic helpers to make the difficult decision between finding gainful employment and providing for their families, or their basic human rights and dignity where they are subjected to a heightened risk of labour-like conditions”.
He added: “This is not an anti-employer application. In the long run both employers and foreign domestic helpers will benefit should the present judicial review challenge be successful.”
They argue that foreign helpers are also put under pressure to stay in abusive households by the so-called two-week rule, which requires them to leave the city within a fortnight should their employment contract be terminated.
Through her lawyers, the applicant said the live-in rule infringed her right to privacy and placed her in a vulnerable position with no means of self-defence.
Until 2003, Hong Kong’s army of domestic helpers did not need to live with their employers under their contracts.
