Hope is moving, and picking up speed, on two fronts for the protection of domestic workers worldwide.  Many of these workers have long laboured outside of the protection of basic labour and human rights standards, both at international and national levels.  Many have been exploited.

One of the two fronts that took a big step forward in June of 2009, when the International Labour Organization (ILO) voted to prepare an international instrument enumerating, for the first tme, labour standards specifically for domestic workers.  In June 2010, the ILO will vote further on whether that instrument should take the form of a convention, a recommendation, a convention supplemented by a recommendation or a convention with both binding and non-binding provisions. The following year will be devoted to the drafting of the instrument, wih a formal vote of adoption in June 2011.

This paper, however, describes the second front, focused on addressing concerns and promoting the protection of basic rights evoked specifically in the situation of migrant domestic workers, who comprise the majority of domestic workers around the world.

Migrant domestic workers: Prospects and process of the UN Committee on Migrant Workers General Comment (411.35 KB)