Labour Ministry inundated with employers and illegal workers

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Labour Ministry inundated with employers and illegal workers 

By Kunlaphun Siripimamporn 
The Nation

 

 

BANGKOK: -- Hundreds of employers and their illegal migrant workers descended on the Labour Ministry on Tuesday morning in response to measures to alleviate the impact of new and stricter foreign labour law. 

Employers with more than 10 workers had to present documents such as pay records, contracts and employment conditions ahead of interviews.

 

But employers with less than 10 workers do not require such documents and will be screened via an interview only.

 

Officials aim to interview 500 applicants a day at the Din Daeng complex.

 

The process follows more than 600,000 illegal migrant workers from Laos, Myanmar and Cambodia being registered at 100 temporary Labour Ministry centres across the country from July 24 to Monday.

 

The centres were set up to ease the impact of the royal decree on Managing the Work of Aliens 2017, which was issued on June 23 and allows for heavy fines to be issued.

 

The scale of the fines is currently being review.

 

Waranon Pitiwan, director-general of the Labour Ministry’s Department of Employment, said the next step of the process involves officials interviewing applicants within 30 days and issuing identification documents for labourers. 

 

Pitiwan said employers must then submit the documents for further processing at one-stop service centres being set up in Thailand by the workers’ countries of origin. 

 

Myanmar has centres in Samut Sakhon, Samut Prakan, Chiang Rai, Tak and Ranong provinces and will open more centres in Chiang Mai, Nakhon Sawan and Songkhla provinces. 

 

Cambodia’s centres are in Rayong, Songkhla and Bangkok. 

 

Lao migrants must contact their country’s embassy in Bangkok.

 

Source: http://www.nationmultimedia.com/detail/national/30323160

 

-- © Copyright The Nation 2017-08-08

[champers]

This seems to be a scheme that will mostly generate extra work for Thai officials. If it is the case that Thailand has an unemployment rate of only 1.5%, then migrant workers are essential and should be welcomed and treated respectfully.

This whole episode begs the question of what is the purpose of ASEAN? Much was made of changes in 2015, but I don't see what has changed. Many ASEAN countries are at odds with each other and look inwards. Most have one thing in common: too often they treat workers from other ASEAN countries little better than livestock.

[yellowboat]

2 hours ago, champers said:

This seems to be a scheme that will mostly generate extra work for Thai officials. If it is the case that Thailand has an unemployment rate of only 1.5%, then migrant workers are essential and should be welcomed and treated respectfully.

This whole episode begs the question of what is the purpose of ASEAN? Much was made of changes in 2015, but I don't see what has changed. Many ASEAN countries are at odds with each other and look inwards. Most have one thing in common: too often they treat workers from other ASEAN countries little better than livestock.

if all the "one stop shops" process 5000 workers a day, that will still take around 120 days to clear 600,000 workers, not including holidays and weekends.  If the actual unemployment number is 1.5%, the should be more lenient, as the economy depends on migrant workers.