Episode 24 - Cynthia Tellez

In this episode, we meet Cynthia Tellez, General Manager of the Mission For Migrant Workers, which provides valuable support services for Hong Kong’s vast community of foreign domestic workers. Cynthia talks about the Mission’s work and the challenges that come her way in a wide-ranging discussion with our Senior Partner Colin Cohen. Stay tuned. 

Host: Colin Cohen
Director: Niall Donnelly
Producer and VO: Thomas Latter 

Transcript

[00:00:32] Colin: Welcome to Law & More. Before we begin our conversations, perhaps I can offer listeners some background. You are the general manager of The Mission for Migrant Workers? This was established in 1981, is a registered charity organization. It is the oldest existing independent service provider for migrant workers in Hong Kong.

Approximately, they're about 330,000 domestic helpers in Hong Kong. About 98% are women and the majority come from either the Philippines or Indonesia. Others from Thailand, Nepal, Sri Lanka and other Asia-developed countries. What's been keeping you busy recently?

[00:01:09] Cynthia: Oh gee, yes, a lot. We keep a very small set of paid staff and we continue gathering volunteers, good-hearted people from Hong Kong who will do work for what we're doing so that we could pass on the knowledge, we could pass on the skills that we have.

And also among migrant workers, it's very important that they, themselves say what is going on among them? And so we have very close relationship with different organizations of migrants, training them on how to do peer support. Training them on some skills that they need while they are in Hong Kong. We do a lot of skills development, including mental health awareness and consciousness so that they would know how to handle themselves, especially during COVID time.

And now, as we pass this on to them, they're able to pass it on to their own members as well. 

[00:02:07] Colin: Yeah, as I know you have core services. Could you explain a little bit more what sort of actual services the mission offers?

[00:02:14] Cynthia: We have the Pastoral care and Welfare Services. We have Labor and Employment Assistance Program. We have documentation, research and information dissemination. Women in the women Empowerment. And these are very standard titals, but what exactly we're doing is that we attend to individual migrants who have problems, who are in a very difficult situation. When they lose their jobs, they have no place to stay, and therefore they're not very sure what to do.

They don't have money to take the plane back home. But they also have a lot of problems on how to deal with unpaid wages, unpaid benefits, and these are the most important things that are happening.

These are problems that affect the lives of these people. These are problems that affect their future. So it's very important for them to be able to know, as simple as, where do I go? What do I say? When I am at the immigration, what do I do? What do I say? How to treat myself and the person that I am talking with. Many times, they tend to defend themselves immediately just to prove that there's nothing that they've done.

Why am I in this situation? But in doing so, some government officials would look at it as you are guilty. You have to explain that to me, without me asking you yet. So these are things that they need to understand, to know. How do they speak with a person in authority? Even if they're nervous, because everybody would feel nervous if it's the first time that they encounter such a situation.

But how do you present yourself even if you are nervous. So that's very important. Even Colin, when you go to court, we have to tell them as simple as meeting in the labor department, labor relations officer. How do you deal with them? How do you answer, how do you look at them? 

I'll give you an example. As Filipinos and even Indonesians, we tend to go around the bush before we start 

[00:04:21] Colin: Yeah. I'm very, very familiar with that.

[00:04:23] Cynthia: When we write a letter, we spend one and a half pages saying, I hope you're in good condition, god bless you, something like that. Before you go straight to the point and you lose it. 

The person who reads this tends to get tired reading it. So we try to train them how to write direct to the point. When I said meeting with the labor officer, when you go there, remember sometimes they have very low temperature in their office. So you bring something to keep you warm, bring something to write down things.

You are allowed to do things like this.

[00:04:57] Colin: Very interesting. I'm intrigued a little bit cause I've known you for so, so many, many years in Hong Kong. Go go back to the eighties. Yeah. 83 when I first was in practice. I'd like to know a little bit about your background. You're from the Philippines obviously, and what brought you to Hong Kong and how do you get involved in this?

 Great work, which you do.

[00:05:16] Cynthia: Yes, it is a church. There was a church that noticed that they are in the outskirts of Hong Kong. At that time, Hung Hom was an outskirts of Hong Kong at that time because it's like a junkyard, it's a shipyard. So they are surprised that there are Filipino's coming to their church. And when they talk to them, they said some of them have problems with employment, but some don't. And even if they don't, there seems to be some level of distress. 

So can we have somebody from the Philippines, a missionary that would look after them.

And so in their own church, they have kind of a documentation center for human rights violations in the Philippines, because we were under martial law at that time. So they asked them, okay, we can ask National Council of Churches in the Philippines. At that time, I was working as a social worker in the fields.

So , the head of the NCCP, National Council of Churches in the Philippines asked me if I could do something in Hong Kong for three months. I said, oh, Bishop, they're better off because they're able to go overseas. People here needs me more. No, no, no. It's only for three months. We do not know what kind of missionary are we going to send there.

So finally I agreed for three months. And in that three months it was not difficult. And before that, a month before I left, nCCP had a visitor from Australia. A pastor from Australia who dropped by Hong Kong in the Methodist Church and said that, can you help me? Because there's this lawyer who asked me to find a way of reaching out to these people because he has a case of this person being accused of false representation or saying something wrong. And we're just lucky that it's not in Manila now, like four hours by plane , or one and a half hours by plane. I mean it was just, an hour and a half from Manila is in Bulahan. So I went there and found the people they were looking for, a priest, a teacher who had the letter of Mr. Melville Boase. Okay, you have this in place. I'll just get a copy and because I'm going next month to Hong Kong and we'll try to see if this has been done. Please do mail this directly to him. I said that. So when I did come to Hong Kong. The first three months was in 1980, August, October, and it was not difficult calling to know what's going on because at that time it's very easy to identify a Filipino from a local person. And every time I see a Filipino, they would like immediately smile at me and ask me to come.

I live in a place 30 minutes from that place to Star Ferry. If I see a Filipino, she would ask me to come and sit with her in the bus and by the time we reach Star Ferry, I would know the story of her life. 

Yes, so it was not easy. I stay at the Star Ferry. I stay at the Statue Square Garden. They told me this is a place where many Filipinos congregate.

And when I am there, people would come to me and ask me, is it your day off? Can you accompany me to the labour department? I too was very nervous. What am I going to do there? No, just be there with me and then come with me to the court. What is there in the court? I've not been in the court in the Philippines.

It's okay, you just be there. But it's so depressing, just be yourself and just be beside me. And to me that was a new experience, and it was not difficult. I contacted many different missionaries of different nationalities. 

[00:08:34] Colin: That time, the Filipinos were the main domestic helpers, in the early days, in the 80s.

[00:08:40] Cynthia: I was conscious because I'm a Protestant. I come from the Philippine Independent Churches, and the Catholic church is the most in numbers, so I said I'm going to contact them. With sisters and fathers among the Catholics and some Protestant church leaders.

We created a small committee that would help me build this information that NCCP needed at that time. So after three months, I went back to the Philippines, gave my report to the NCCP, and forgot about Hong Kong. I was also so homesick at that time when I was in Hong Kong. After that, I got another call from the bishop.

After three months, I said, no, Bishop has not said anything. I know, Cynthia, you know why I'm calling you. You see no takers. We're looking for a missionary exactly of what you were explaining and the description, but no takers and besides they have to raise their own funds, no available funds. A church in Hong Kong is willing to lend you money, but that's lending and you have to establish a relationship and sources of funding. That's not easy.

[00:09:48] Colin: So that's how you all started up. Nowadays, how many full-time workers do you have at the mission right now.

[00:09:53] Cynthia: We have five.

[00:09:54] Colin: So it's five full-time workers. And as such, we read a lot in the media difficulties with workers.

I like to sort of concentrate to help our listeners as to what are the real core issues and the real problems that are affecting migrant workers. And I can split these into various group. And just to give our listeners a bit of a background, we have what's called the two week rule. To help everyone, this was introduced in 1987. 

I remember that very, very clearly because I was involved in that case. And it goes back a long way. And basically the government then decided that many helpers came to Hong Kong and people were trying to change jobs, et cetera, et cetera.

And what they did, all of a sudden they changed the regulations that made it. Once you were terminated or the contract was brought to an end and they knew about it, then the helper had to leave Hong Kong within two weeks. Now that caused endless difficulties, problems because they were vulnerable, they got terminated, outstanding wages were there, and therefore Mel Boase passed the file to myself and we then challenged, and we lost gloriously at first instance in Hong Kong. Court of appeal, then also upheld the first instance Judge. But then we got leave to go to the Privy Council 

[00:11:10] Cynthia: Correct. 

[00:11:11] Colin: And we all went off to the Privy Council, it was a pre 1997, and the Privy Council heard the case. And of course, during the discussions, when I was there, the very eminent Law Lord, sit in the Privy Council. And they asked very, very pertinent questions to the then Attorney General Michael Thomas. Just saying, well look, what about what happens if someone has a outstanding wages or has a personal injury action or has something else? And in turn they said, oh, well, what we would do, they'll always be special circumstances, and if you can show a special circumstances pending matters we would allow them to remain. So the Privy Council dismissed the appeal. But in reality, and I'm interested to ask you now, the two week rule, is it really a big worry for helpers anymore? Because it seems to me that as long as they know how to deal with it, they can remain in Hong Kong to deal with those matters. I like your views on that.

[00:12:06] Cynthia: Well, there are two things in that that's true, positive and negative. The positive things that we actually won for the next 10 years. After that, we could easily write either to the immigration department or the security council and we explain why they have to stay in Hong Kong while this thing is going on. Why they can transfer to another employer because of this situation. And so that's a long statement from the domestic worker. And for the next 10 months, before 1997. 

[00:12:42] Colin: 10 years. 

[00:12:42] Cynthia: 10 years, yes. So that's still a good thing. Even if you are not transferring to another employer, you could stay while your case is going on. This is very important. But of course we still did not stop. We went to the United Nations, to the Rights Commission and we won by saying one, that Hong Kong has to improve its policy and removed the two week rule because it is affecting the future of migrant domestic workers who are in trouble because they're prevented from leaving a very difficult situation.

[00:13:17] Colin: Yes, and what is quite interesting because with COVID for the last three years, there was the two week rule, it was like it's been parked because there were no flights. Now I personally think that, from all the work that we do, because I'm gonna talk a little bit about our relationships, the founder of our firm with myself, how we work and how we help you out.

But I don't see the two week rule as being the real, real problem that faces. I think two other issues, living in the same household. I mean, that's a vexed question. And of course the courts have ruled is a, deal with it. The contract provides for you to live there.

And the other one is numerous instructions from employers to please go down to my office and clean my office. Please go and clean my daughter's car. Please go and help my neighbor out as well. Are they real issues? 

[00:14:07] Cynthia: Very much, yes. We have a campaign since, We started with coming out with a booklet showing how the different policies in different governments in different countries are with regards international standards hiring foreign domestic workers. Now, three years after that, we had another booklet showing exactly the accommodation, they're being provided by employers and that are not very acceptable. And so we continuously write to the government, to the immigration, to the labor department, to the Legco members, giving them copies of all of these findings that we have, the pictures from the inside that reveals, that followed up with another similar thing.

We continue asking the women migrants send us the pictures of their accommodations. So that makes it clear that it's really very difficult. And not only that, when things go wrong, when physical abuse, sexual abuse are happening, it's very difficult to prove because all the burden of proof is on them.

And you cannot get somebody inside to witness for you if things are going on. 

[00:15:18] Colin: And of course, the landmark cases which we've been involved in are the ones of real physical abuse. And then when you see, scolded with hot irons and, at the airport full of bruises, there were a couple of cases.

So we've been able to deal with those matters. Although I think it's to be very fair that with most, it's the minority. There's a few bad apples in that card. And I think we always need to make it clear that most helpers and most employers do have a harminous and a reasonable relationship. 

[00:15:48] Cynthia: Right? Yes, that's true, that's true, Colin. That is why our proposal to the government is make live out an option. For that will be agreed between the employer and the employee. Why don't we have that? Why can't we have that? Because a lot of migrant domestic workers also feel that to stay in the the same place because it's easier for them. After the day's work. They can immediately rest. But there are those who have difficult situation inside the household. 

[00:16:14] Colin: And it's quite interesting. Quite a few, I know employers would like it because they like to have their own privacy a little bit. The good ones want it as well. 

[00:16:22] Cynthia: That's true, before 2003, we still have cases of employers being allowed by immigration to have their domestic workers live out. I remember one friend who shares with three other colleagues in her office. She told me that they were renting a flat for their domestic workers because they cannot have them inside their house.

 I and my husband purchased this flat when we were still boyfriends and girlfriends. And we planned our family and when finally we had a child, we wanted someone to be with us, but not full time. So we can tell her, come stay with us for six hours or eight hours and then we'll set you free.

You'll live somewhere else. And that is how she developed a relationship with other colleagues and they rented a place so that the domestic workers stay in that place. At that time. The immigration can still allow that, until 2003. 

There are a lot of happy families. We have a program called Happy Homes because we know that there are very good-hearted people in Hong Kong, and they treat their domestic workers well. We want them to come forward. We know they're very quiet, they're very silent. Because what you hear are those complaints against domestic workers.

[00:17:34] Colin: And of course as just sort of do a plug for you. If anybody wants to help and to be part of your charitable work and to help people. You are located at St. John's Cathedral. The mission has an office there. So all my listeners have to do, if they want to put their hands up and help. Just turn up and they will be welcomed with open arms, correct?

[00:17:54] Cynthia: Yes, please. That's right. 

[00:17:56] Colin: Yeah, now the other area which I want to talk to you about which I think is a real issue are the employment agencies. And it's a very vexxed question because, especially when in COVID getting the contracts all dealt with, the red tape and dealing with the Philippine government, Hong Kong government, and the agencies. Your views on that? 

[00:18:13] Cynthia: Hong Kong government doesn't require domestic workers or employers to go through agencies, but they are existing. The problem is the Philippine government and the Indonesian government require that. And there are those who tell employers that, oh, this is just on papers.

You can do this, you can do that. Violations of the contract, and they do the violations. they hold the passwords until the migrant worker is able to pay, quote unquote agency fees.

[00:18:38] Colin: Yes. And that's the real, real problem. And then they go for loans and the loan sharks are linked into the agency and then it gets very very difficult. 

[00:18:48] Cynthia: That's true, unfortunately, many employers think that migrant domestic workers are very fond of borrowing money.

They don't realize that even if we're coming to Hong Kong, they're already indebted because of agency fees. 

[00:18:59] Colin: In the Philippines? 

[00:19:00] Cynthia: In the Philippines, in Indonesia.

And the arrangement is very clean. They would receive a message from a loan agency in Hong Kong saying that, I understand that you borrowed money from our partner money lending company in Indonesia or in the Philippines.

Your customer card, it's like an ATM card. And you could go to this place, deposit this amount of money every month, which is about three fourths to almost like 90% of their salary and go to 7-Eleven or any convenience stores to pay that. And when they come to us and, and tell us to help them, we would ask, you have a receipt.

They would say, yes, we do. But the receipt they have, they're holding. It's a 7-Eleven receipt, but doesn't say anything. 

Agencies that are encouraging illegal arrangements is something that has to be addressed by the government. Because I know that Liberty Partners saying that, oh, we've already come out with a good code of ethics for agencies.

How would they know that they're they're following it? 

[00:20:00] Colin: Yeah, I mean it really is a real problem and we help out quite a lot in giving advice. And we did a case whereby we were able to get a prosecution instituted because they were withholding the passport. And that particular money lenders company is being blackballed. I wanna talk a little bit about, COVID, thank goodness we're coming to the end of it. Normality coming back as well. But that really affected helpers. Not only with some employers were being really strict, so they're basically saying, you are not going out as well. Then with the way which when they went out, only two together, I'm not gonna say harassed, but hassled and do you have issues about that? 

[00:20:38] Cynthia: Oh, yes. Very, very difficult situation. Not only that, as you said, that they're not allowed to go out. I have a case where the whole night we were holding the telephone because she could anymore, take it. She's not been allowed for six months already.

And I said, why don't you talk to your employer? And I say, no. Every time she would go into a tantrum and yell at me and everything. So what we did was to, okay, follow this. Write down the things that you want to say. Nevermind if she yells at you, shouts at you.

Every time she breathes, she'll stop, say something. And so she wrote down all these things and she made me listen to what she say. Maam, can I go out? No. But Sir goes out every day. He only goes to the office, etc. And he comes back immediately. Papa comes every Sunday. It doesn't matter, I know where papa lives and he comes only here and goes back to her house. You, I do not know where you're going. Maam, I promise you I will only go just downstairs. Just downstairs. Give me even just two hours.

She got the two hours after six months. From two hours to four hours to seven hours, and later on she was okay.

This is very difficult because COVID made migrant domestic workers like the impression of being carriers so that there are a lot of policies addressing two migrant workers. To them, mental health was an issue, became an issue, to the point of depression.

So we have, programs now dealing on mental health, mental health seminars. Support from a company that would allow free professional counseling. 

[00:22:15] Colin: And that's great, great work. which I would like to develop a little bit. It's linked into the incident which you described and the work that Mel Boase did in the past. It's the human trafficking issue. More and more, it's beginning to be recognized that helpers do find themselves trapped in basically forced labor and other matters as well. And I think that's a big, big problem. The other area which I'm interested in, is the discrimination. Which people face. And how you do to help that as well and educate. Can you tell us a little bit about that? 

[00:22:45] Cynthia: Yes, in terms of discrimination, that's very much felt. It's very difficult to describe when you feel that. We're glad that we have equal opportunity, this commission. But you have to be very, very clear about what you are complaining about. If it comes to racial discrimination. It's very specific in terms of policy. And domestic workers can immediately feel that when they are domestic workers, the kind of look that they get from other people. Is that you are lower than me. That kind of thing still exists, unfortunately.

And, in shops, they still feel that. Especially when they're window shopping. They would be followed, which is not done with other people around.

So that's in public. Now, inside the house. It's more distinct in terms of, you should know where you belong. You should know where you are. You are in that situation. Whatever I say is a command and therefore you should follow, even if it's already illegal, as we were mentioning earlier. You have to go to my mother's house and clean my mother's house and I am your boss and therefore you should follow, otherwise you lose your job. 

[00:23:52] Colin: It's difficult as well. And in the end of which, our firm does a lot of training. We help your people to take instructions, we give guidance and other matters as well.

But the real issue, which I always see, is that the people that end up being prosecuted with all of this, Caught at the mother-in-law's, and they currently very, very rare to do the employer for aiding and abetting. Although right now they're beginning to wake up a little bit. 

[00:24:16] Cynthia: I hope so. Just say we continue. That's why a lot of migrants do not want to say that because when they tell them the truth, the thing is that they're prosecuted, as you said. Even in, human trafficking when they report the matter to the authorities.

 I remember we were trying to push the government to come out with the anti-trafficking law. They said, oh, we have all the laws in place. From police to immigration, et cetera. Problem is they end up being prosecuted many times over because they will say they violated immigration law. It's a crime to do this, and they don't see it holistically, 

[00:24:50] Colin: I just want to sort of talk a little bit about the refuge. When people are really treated and we end up, nowhere to go thrown out on the street. Tell us a little bit how many people you have there and how you deal it. 

[00:25:00] Cynthia: Yes, when we started, we started with thinking of setting up the mission for Filipino migrant workers in the beginning. We dropped the name. Yes, yes, when Indonesians started coming in. So that was in 2005 at the height of the number of Indonesians.

So in the beginning we were already had that plan. But it was like setting up two institutions. So we decided we'll just do some kind of a list of people who are willing to house, share their space with those who are in trouble. And so finally, five years later, five women came forward and said, from the church especially, and migrants who wanted to do something about sheltering.

And so we said, oh, that's part of our program and this is our plan. You can improve on that and see what we can do. So they raised funds and then set up the Bethune House Migrant Women's Refuge. And reason being that in the churches, every now and then, the guard would say, oh, Filipino there lying down under the staircase because she was sacked by the employer.

And with this, it was not difficult to explain why they need that. We have at any given time, from 20 to 50 depending on the season. There are seasons where you get a lot of termination of contracts. And they lose it and they are not paid.

And some employees have left Hong Kong. Sometimes , they cannot trace where the employers are. I'm sure we've been sending you cases, we've been asking you for advice. for a lot of such cases. So Bethune House provides food and shelter. Because most of the time they don't have money, they lose their job.

Their own belongings because they have to run away because of difficult situation. And then they go back, they cannot find their belongings anymore. And so what they do is run and ask help from us. 

[00:26:48] Colin: Yeah, and, and you all interrelated. And of course at the same time, we provide the legal services, all the advice. The basic stuff to ensure that they can try and get back their wages.

 Now, we've talked a lot about discrimination. We've talked about the difficult matters. Let's talk about some of the positive matters. And as far as I'm aware, we're seeing more examples of, migrant workers becoming heavily involved in the society, offering their services, helping out with charities.

We've seen a lot involved, especially from the Sri Lankan community. A migrant worker's cricket team, which has been very, very successful. Which is a positive matter as well. They do dragon boat racing. And , in my view, they sort of contribute greatly to Hong Kong's culture and diversity. Your views on that?

[00:27:30] Cynthia: Yes, we're happy. They are starting to feel that they belong. Even if on a temporary basis they are in Hong Kong. People of Hong Kong are welcoming them, letting them join their teams.

And that is, I think, very positive. And we thank good-hearted people for that. There are those who also among themselves would come together even if immediate purpose is for support for those who have problems. Also they give support to others. Before COVID, there were those who were going to some elderly homes to give care. 

[00:28:02] Colin: On their day off.

[00:28:03] Cynthia: On their day off! This is happening and I think more of this should happen because it's very positive. We want to see a Hong Kong that is more people who are. Because I don't think, there is a give and take relationship. 

[00:28:19] Colin: Yeah. And I have to say this, majority of employers and families recognize how important the domestic helpers are to them recognize all of this. The mission is a fabulous institution. It works in the community. We are so happy to see you contributing to making Hong Kong a more cosmopolitan and more culturally and ethnically diverse. And we do all hope there will be changes in the future for the better integration of our migrant workers. It's been an honor, a great pleasure to talk to you. Thank you for joining Law & More. 

[00:28:53] Cynthia: Thank you very much. Also, it's a pleasure to be here.