[child-rights] Shackled dreams, lost learning: The costs of child domestic labour

***Learn more about the World Day Against Child Labour, 12 June 2004:
http://www.hrea.org/feature-events/day-against-childlabour.php


ILO Press release
9 June 2004

They are the hidden face of child labour. In Latin America, nearly 2
million girls are child domestic labourers. Like millions of other
children employed outside of their family homes * often in abusive,
exploitative conditions * they form a vast, cadre who are hidden behind
closed doors, can't go to school and face a lost childhood. This year's
World Day Against Child Labour focuses on their plight, and their hopes
for the future.

	GENEVA (ILO Online) - "I wanted to study, make a career, become a
famous soap opera actress", says 17 year old Leidy from Colombia. But her
dream was harshly shattered when at only 10 years old she had to find work
in someone else's house to help support her sick mother. One year later
she left the school.

	Nearly 2 million girls share Leidy's fate in Latin America and the
Caribbean. The ILO considers child domestic workers one of the most
vulnerable groups of child labourers in the world today. And their working
conditions - often long hours behind closed doors, hidden within the
privacy of other people's homes - make efforts to protect them from abuse
or exploitation much harder.

   	"They have limited access to education and no time to play. With
little or no pay and even fewer rights or protection under the law, they
are highly vulnerable and almost totally unseen," reports the ILO in "The
Invisible Children", a brochure on child domestic workers.

	The World Day Against Child Labour this year is dedicated to
giving visibility to the situation of child domestic labourers.

	"In many countries of the world, children working as
child-minders, maids, cooks, cleaners, gardeners and general house-helps
are a familiar sight", says the ILO in a new report on this subject,
"Helping Hands or Shackled Lives? Understanding child domestic labour and
responses to it" (http://www.ilo.org/ipec) that will be published on eve
of the world day.

	The ILO's International Programme on the Elimination of Child
Labour (IPEC) estimates that more than 200 million children between ages 5
and 17 work worldwide. Of these, more girls under the age of 16 are
employed in domestic service than in any other form of work.

	According to the IPEC definition, "child domestic labour refers to
situations where children are engaged to perform domestic tasks in the
home of a third party or employer that are exploitative". When this
practice also includes trafficking, slavery or other forms of forced
labour, or hazardous work that will likely harm the health, safety or
moral well being of the child, it becomes a worst form of child labour.

	Exploitation can take several forms: economic exploitation by
having to work long hours for low wages; a lack of legal protection; or
exposure to harsh and dangerous working conditions. Children are also
deprived of the rights to play and enjoy good health, education, freedom
from sexual abuse or harassment, and even family visits.  Some are also
subjected to verbal, physical, emotional and in some cases even sexual
abuse.

	ILO/IPEC projects help countries tackle the goal of preventing and
eradicating child domestic labour on two fronts: political action to
increase the ratification and implementation of international conventions,
and the development of national, regional or local law. At a social level,
efforts are aimed at helping child labourers directly, while fighting the
invisibility of the problem through awareness-raising campaigns that can
mobilize key sectors of society.

	Leidy's story was collected as part of a project implemented
during the last 3 years in Brazil, Colombia, Paraguay and Peru by ILO/IPEC
with financial support from US Department of Labour (USDOL) and
participation from government agencies and civil society organizations in
each country.

	In Colombia, where available data indicates that more than 300,000
children are engaged in domestic work, one survey showed that 77 per cent
start working before they are 14 years old. All the girls and boys
surveyed earned salaries under the national minimum wage, and as many as
63 per cent of the girls over 14 years had left school.

	Leidy, who is a young mother, now has a goal for the future: "I
have worked all my life, and even if as my mother says, work does not
dishonour anyone, I hope my child will not have to work as much as I did.
I want him to grow up with another mentality and to get a job when he has
grown up."


For further information, please contact the ILO Department of
Communication, phone: +4122/799-7912; fax: +4122/799-8577; e-mail:
communication@ilo.org.


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