HK Update: Empowering Community Leaders with the IOM

November 13, 2016
Category: Training & Workshops
participants-of-iom-workshop
Indonesian community leaders at an IOM-sponsored training. JWB provided foundational knowledge on how to pursue civil compensation, even after returning home.

JWB recently trained more than 150 caseworkers and community leaders at two seminars hosted by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) in Hong Kong. The events focused on protecting victims of human trafficking, with JWB focusing on civil compensation in Hong Kong for victims who return home to Indonesia and the Philippines.

speaker-at-iom-workshop
JWB Board Member Michelle Yu leads a training on cross-border access to compensation for migrant workers.

JWB guided the participants through a sample case scenario of a worker who faced common types of exploitation, including unpaid wages, debt bondage, physical abuse and injury at work. Participants actively identified the issues and discussed the possible remedies the worker might pursue. The session emphasized the importance of identifying possible causes of action and collecting evidence, as well as the procedural hurdles in helping workers make legal claims. We also introduced Hong Kong’s Technology Court as a potential tool to ease the time and financial cost of cross-border litigation.

participants-at-iom-workshop

Community leaders in both sessions were very active in the discussion and were interested to learn more about how their clients could continue seeking compensation in Hong Kong, even after returning home. We are proud to be part of this effort to empower migrant workers in Hong Kong, and look forward to working with these leaders and their organisations to build the knowledge and know-how necessary to make access to just compensation possible for more of their clients.