MIGRANT WATCH

“Taxing the Poor, Hong Kong Style” 
Hong Kong Filipino Maids Decry Tax Levy

Filipino domestic helpers in Hong Kong have once again taken to the streets in a desperate attempt to stop the Hong Kong government from implementing a HK$9,600 tax on their employers who will simply pass on the burden to them through a HK$400 monthly wage cut. This will bring down the wages of foreign domestic helpers, already among the poorest of Hong Kong society, to 1992 levels.

BY BULATLAT.COM

Hong Kong FDHs supposedly receive an average of HK$3,670 (US$482 or PhP26,200) but deductions by employment agencies and other expenses leave them with only a little more than half of this figure to send to their families in the Philippines. 

The Hong Kong government says it needs to impose the new tax in order to solve its budget deficit.

Connie Bragas-Regalado, spokesperson of the Asian Migrants Coordinating Body (AMCB), said, “It is the height of cruelty (for the Hong Kong government) to ask the foreign domestic helpers ‘to bear the pain’ of Hong Kong economic problems. It is a travesty of justice to rob foreign maids of an equivalence to a three-month salary and call it equitable.”

She also said that it is possible for the employers to either increase the monthly pay slash or totally refuse to give their helpers salaries for a few months for them to recover what they paid for at the soonest possible time.

In one of their rallies dubbed as “Taxing the Poor, Hong Kong Style,” a participant representing the Hong Kong government feasts on a huge rice bowl labeled as “government revenues” while chopsticking a piece of food marked with “HK$9,600 tax levy” and “HK$400 wage cut” from a bowl being scripmed on by a domestic helper.

Regalado added that the FDHs and their families have already carried the burden of a 5% wage reduction three years ago and seven years without wage increase despite the rise of daily cost of living in the Philippines and Hong Kong.

Early last year, the Hong Kong government has attempted to impose a 5% wage cut on foreign domestic helpers. However, the proposal was not implemented due to protests of the foreign maids.

Chief Executive Tung Chee-hwa and Executive Council members met on February 18 to deliberate on the proposed tax levy.

On March 5, the Hong Kong Finance Secretary will deliver a speech containing Hong Kong’s comprehensive financial policy, including the reported 5% (HK$183) wage cut considered by the HK government.

AMCB, an alliance of different Asian migrant workers groups in Hong Kong, will make use of Hong Kong’s legal system to test its legitimacy and legality.

“Even the international community will know of the government’s barbarism as we are prepared to take such a discriminatory policy to the regional and international agencies and institutions. Asia’s World City may very well be Asia’s shame,” Regalado said.

Meanwhile, Labor Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas said the Philippine government is looking into the possibility of not approving contracts providing salaries below the current HK$3,760 (US$482). Bulatlat.com

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