Press Releases

Ever wonder what goes behind the helpline? This report profiles the services rendered by the helpline, its operational capacity and the types of complaints and enquiries received from 18 December 2006 to 30 July 2007. It also highlights the resources required for the helpline to improve and keep us going! Now available for download.

A regular day off for domestic workers
The Standard Contract Is Not Working: It Is Time For It To Be Made Law

On September 15th 2006, a new standard employment contract for domestic workers was due to be implemented across the whole of the employment agency industry in Singapore. Its terms had been agreed by the two accreditation bodies for agencies, the Association of Employment Agencies (Singapore) and CASETrust.

A key feature of the contract was the clause concerning time off for the worker. It gave signatories the options of agreeing that the worker should have one, two, three or four days off per month. In theory, this meant that the worker could be sure of receiving at least one day a month when she could relax and go out to spend her time as she chose.

Unfortunately, this provision was undermined by another that allowed an employer to pay a worker extra money on top of her regular wage to give up her time off.

On August 6th, there is a special preview screening of Nick Broomfield's GHOSTS. The film is a dramatisation of what led to the drowning of 23 Chinese migrant workers in Morecambe Bay, northern England, in February 2004. Proceeds from the ticket sales will be divided between Transient  Workers Count Too, Migrant Voices and a fund for the Morecambe Bay tragedy victims' families. The screening will be  followed by a discussion on the issues raised by the film, and is co-organised with the British Council and Golden Village.

For all that you make possible, thank you from Singapore' was the theme to IMD 2006. Organised by TWC2 and mainly sponsored by Telcom 1515, the event saw the helpline number launched at Ananda Bhavan restaurant in Little India.

Transient Workers Count Too(TWC2) a local non-governmental organization that advocates for the well-being of migrant workers and improvements in the relationship between employers and employees, would like to submit the following statement as some of our concerns with regards to the policies of World Bank(WB) and the International Monetary Fund(IMF). Trade liberalization, privatization, and labour market deregulation are some of the policies that impact labour movement and labour standards of migrant workers.