Settlement reached between [Thai seafood] factory and Cambodian workers

Thursday, May 17, 2012
FIS.com

A conclusive settlement was finally reached this week between a Thai seafood factory and its Cambodian employees, Cambodian Ambassador You Ay celebrated.

The company has been accused of various abuses against its workers -- including breach of wage obligations and withholding migrant workers' passports -- by rights groups and employees at the Phatthana Seafood factory in Songkhla province. Phatthana Seafood is owned by PTN Group, which supplies retail juggernaut Wal-Mart.

Through ongoing protests by hundreds of workers last April, the workers have obtained concessions from the factory on wages, possession of passports and a food allowance. Now they want free housing, which they say was promised to them by Cambodian labour firm CDM Trading Manpower in the contracts they signed to send them to work in Thailand, Phnom Penh Post reports.

Sawit Kaewvarn, secretary-general of the State Enterprises Workers' Relations Confederation (SERC), sent a letter last week to Rajan Kamalatan, an executive of Wal-mart's Ethical Sourcing Department, requesting that he look into the rights violations.

"SERC concluded there were labour right violations occurring in the factory on a number of different issues, including violations of the Labour Relations Act regarding contracts, wages and compensation," said the letter, according to Bangkok Post.

"There were also violations of the Labour Protection Act including date, duration, job description, wages, as well as the working environment which was reported to be unsafe," it said.

Megan Murphy, Wal-Mart’s international corporate affairs manager, said last month that the retail giant was investigating.

You Ay helped reach a deal for the workers to receive free housing, have CDM Trading Manpower visit the factory monthly and attend to their access to healthcare, she explained.

The problem remains, however, that these workers are semi-legal and have few financial resources -- and thus obtaining passports and becoming legal workers is expensive, the ambassador noted.

“I do hope that everything is better now, and I promise to you that I will follow up everything that the factory and CDM agreed with workers,” she said.