HONG KONG—On any given Sunday, public spaces here are filled with young women from across Southeast Asia whose presence has become a signature of Hong Kong: foreign-born maids enjoying their one weekly day off.
Tens of thousands of domestic workers fan across places like Victoria Park, huddling together eating, singing, dancing, reading or playing cards. Sunday offers an escape from long days of housekeeping and child care, which often start at dawn and stretch well into the evening.
Some are young and newly arrived, but many have lived here for years, some even decades.
Those long-term domestic workers are the focus of a court case that has prompted marches and daily coverage in the local media, and fueled an emotional debate about what it means to be a Hong Kong resident.
On Monday, a High Court judge started hearing arguments in the landmark case filed by a Filipino domestic worker, who has challenged a legal provision denying permanent residency to hundreds of thousands of foreign maids in Hong Kong.
Evangeline Banao Vallejos, who has lived and worked in Hong Kong since 1986, and her supporters are fighting for equal treatment with the city’s other foreign residents.
Nineteen people were arrested for public order offenses after supporters and protesters clashed over the issue at rallies on the eve of the hearing.
Vallejos launched the legal battle after her attempts for permanent residency were denied by immigration authorities.
Discriminatory
Vallejos’ lawyers argued that the provision denying helpers the right to apply for permanent residency after seven years in Hong Kong contravenes the Basic Law, Hong Kong’s mini-constitution.
Other foreigners can apply for permanent residency after seven years.
Vallejos’ lawyers said in opening arguments that the authorities’ refusal to grant her permanent residency was discriminatory and unconstitutional.
“There is no criteria (in the Basic Law) that any group must satisfy certain higher standards,” counsel Gladys Li told the High Court, which was packed with journalists, lawyers and activists.
“There is no exclusion based on race, religion, nationality … or place of birth.”
It is time, Vallejos’ lawyers argued, that she be granted permanent residency.
Helpers excluded
Vallejos was not present in court but scores of her supporters held a brief rally outside before the start of the hearing.
Vallejos’ case is the first of five launched by current and former Filipino helpers who are challenging the rule.
Permanent residents have the right to vote and greater access to public services, like healthcare, and may bring spouses, dependent children and, in some cases, parents into Hong Kong.
Under the Basic Law, noncitizens are entitled to permanent residency if they have “ordinarily resided” in the city for a continuous seven years.
The immigration laws, however, specifically exclude domestic workers—who number 292,000 in a territory of seven million and who come primarily from Indonesia and the Philippines, making up the bulk of Hong Kong’s non-Chinese population.
Vallejos came to Hong Kong in 1986 to work as a maid and has been employed by the same family since 1987.
Repercussions
Observers say a ruling for Vallejos would be a landmark not just for Hong Kong, but for the region.
“In many Asian countries, domestic workers are not even given a day off in a week,” said Nilim Baruah, a chief technical adviser with the International Labor Organization (ILO) in Bangkok.
The case has fueled spirited debate in Hong Kong.
Some decry what they see as discrimination against foreign-born maids; other say giving them permanent status could have serious economic consequences.
“Everyone knows that this is a legal issue, but it is spilling into the political arena,” said Kylie Uebergang, an executive of Civic Exchange, a nonpartisan public policy research group.
Opponents of Vallejos’ cause—notably, political parties and trade organizations affiliated with the government—point out that other groups, like diplomats and contract workers brought in for specific assignments, are also ineligible for permanent residency.
500,000 more people
The pro-Beijing party, Democratic Alliance for the Betterment and Progress of Hong Kong, estimated as many as 125,000 foreign domestic helpers could be eligible to apply for permanent residency now, if the law were changed.
Assuming all eligible domestics would gain permanent status and bring family members to Hong Kong, the party estimated as many as 500,000 people could move into the territory, a scenario that could worsen unemployment and put new strains on social welfare services and an already tight housing market.
Fally Choi, of the Asia Monitor Resource Center, a rights group supporting Vallejos’ appeal, calls such claims “nonscientific and irresponsible.”
Beijing intervention
Foreign domestic workers began flooding into Hong Kong in the 1980s. Maids in Hong Kong enjoy more rights than do their counterparts elsewhere in Asia, said Fish Ip Pui-yu, organizing secretary of the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions.
Maids are guaranteed one day off a week, have a minimum wage, are covered by insurance for work-related injuries and can go before Hong Kong’s Labor Tribunal to address issues like unpaid wages or firing without cause.
Should the High Court ruling, and any appeals, go in Vallejos’ favor, the government could find other ways to keep domestics from attaining permanent status.
It could place a limit on how long they can work in Hong Kong, preventing them from staying for seven consecutive years.
The government could also seek Beijing’s interpretation of the Basic Law. That possibility has generated concern among people who fear for civil liberties.
The maids are a big part of the economy in Hong Kong, where it’s common for families to employ one or more maids to live with them. The money they send back to their home countries is a big source of income for their families.
120,000 Filipinos
The number of Filipino workers in Hong Kong dropped to about 120,000 last year compared to more than 200,000 several years ago, while those from Indonesia have grown.
According to government figures, workers in Hong Kong sent back home $312 million in 2010 compared to a total value of remittances of $18.8 billion, or about 10 percent of the country’s annual gross domestic product.
The case could pressure ties between Hong Kong and the Philippines, which have already been strained after a hostage crisis on a tour bus in Manila a year ago left eight people from Hong Kong dead. Reports from New York Times News Service, AP and AFP