KUWAIT: The domestic labor department of Kuwait's General Directorate of Immigration is introducing new measures to safeguard the rights of Kuwait's domestic labor workforce, according to department head Brigadier Abdullah Al-Ali. One major change to the current system will be the introduction of legislation compelling employers to pay maids directly into their own bank accounts to avoid any type of embezzlement or withholding of salaries.

This legislation is still in its initial stages, however, due to the failure of many Kuwaiti banks to sign up to the new system since the domestic workers' salaries are considered too low to justify setting up bank accounts, while the Central Bank of Kuwait has also raised some objections. The new measures, which come in response to recent concerns over abuses of domestic workers' rights, will cover all domestic workers, from maids to drivers, cooks and others, he explained.

Brigadier Al-Ali explained that the directorate will specifically target those bodies and individuals concerned with this issue, working closely with recruitment agencies, sponsors and the domestic workers themselves. As well as protecting these workers' rights, the new procedures will help in removing Kuwait's name from the blacklist of countries criticized in the US State Department's 2009 Human Trafficking report for the conditions of migrant workers.

Some of the procedures will take effect at once, while others will take more time," Brig. Al-Ali explained. Some citizens, too, have expressed misgivings about the new regulation. Mohammad Al-Kandari, the head of a Kuwaiti family of five which employs three maids and a chauffeur, said that having to pay one's domestic staff on a monthly basis could disrupt the household budget of those homes with a number of servants.

For this reason, he said, some families pay their servants on a quarterly basis rather than giving them their wages every month. Al-Kandari also complained that paying servants' salaries direct to their bank accounts would cause more problems than it would solve, saying "Why fix something that's not broken?

Mona Al-Shehab, a housewife and mother-of-two whose family employs two maids, a cook and a chauffeur, said that some households in Kuwait employ more servants than they need in order to make their lives easier. "Later on when it's time to pay the maids their wages, those people tend to underpay them so that they can afford that extra maid that sits all day long doing nothing," she said. The Commercial Bank of Kuwait is the largest bank to offer current accounts for those on low salaries in Kuwait, with man
y account holders being paid KD 350 per month or less, a source from the bank said.

CBK has a specialist branch dealing specifically with account holders on low wages, whose charges are less than those for better paid customers, the source explained. The Gulf Bank also offer an account for those on minimal salaries, along with various other flexible accounts for low earners. Neither bank has yet commented, however, on whether it will be participating in the new payment system for domestic workers, although senior executives have welcomed the idea of working closely with the immigration de
partment.

Brigadier Al-Ali has also announced that there will be other amendments to the current system governing the employment of domestic workers, with the department working closely with various embassies to provide a refuge for domestic workers fleeing abuse. This shelter will be able to accommodate a maximum of 1,000 people, taking the pressure off local embassies which currently have to house 90 percent of the maids fleeing abuse. The domestic labor recruitment agencies, meanwhile, will also be subject to mo
re scrutiny and stricter conditions, which will include increasing the cost of their licenses from the current KD 5,000 to KD 20,000. - Kuwait Times