More should be done to protect migrant workers coming to Britain, Oxfam has said. Kate Wareing, Oxfam’s UK Poverty Director, told BBC One’s News at One that in a survey produced by the charity ten percent of the 312 domestic migrant workers questioned had suffered sexual abuse, 26 percent physical abuse and 72 percent psychological abuse from employers. She said that their lack of language skills, social networks and knowledge of their rights puts such workers in more danger than British citizens. Ms Wareing recommended: “The first vital thing is that they should have full information about what rights they have and we think that’s an incredibly important role of foreign embassies at the point people are entering the UK.” The report found that just 20 percent of those questioned had been given such information and none of them had received it in their own language. According to migrantworker.co.uk, such employees make up ten percent of the UK working population and seven percent of the population as a whole.

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7 July 2008
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