Consultant for Developing a Model Contract with Standard Terms of Employment for Women Migrant Domestic Workers (Open to Sri Lankan Nationals Only)

Background

UN Women, grounded in the vision of equality enshrined in the Charter of the United Nations, works for the elimination of discrimination against women and girls; the empowerment of women; and the achievement of equality between women and men as partners and beneficiaries of development, human rights, humanitarian action and peace and security.

With the global mandate for facilitating economic empowerment of women, UN Women Sri Lanka has been working towards promoting the rights of migrant women domestic workers (MWDWs) as a part of the regional programme on the ‘Empowerment of Women Migrant Workers in South Asia through Implementation of the Standard Terms of Employment (STOE)’.

MWDWs constitute the bulk of all female workers emigrating from Sri Lanka. In 2016, out of a total of 82,628 women who migrated abroad for employment, 79 per cent were registered under the domestic worker category whilst only 5 per cent emigrated under the skilled category, 2 per cent under the clerical category and 0.6 per cent under the professional category (Research Division-SLBFE, 2017). Correspondingly, countries of destination such as the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states; Hong Kong, Mauritius, Japan and Romania recognized Sri Lanka as one of the main source countries for migrant domestic workers (Research Division-SLBFE, 2017).

Despite emigrating in large numbers and belonging to a principal source country, MWDWs face a host of challenges with regards to their right to decent work including access to social protection, fair wages, gender sensitive healthcare and justice. For example, at the pre-departure stage, they face the risk of exploitation at the hands of unethical recruitment agencies/agents/sub-agents including the charging of exorbitant fees and misinformation about terms of work and living conditions. Upon arrival in the country of destination, MWDWs face ‘contract substitution’ by the sub-agent in the destination country, including being forced to work for many more hours for less or no pay. Besides linguistic and cultural barriers and limited or no access to collective bargaining, MWDWs also face restrictions on their freedom of movement and association, inadequate food and accommodation, lack of privacy and a high risk of sexual and gender-based violence. Worldwide, an additional challenge is that domestic work is still not recognized as ‘work’; this among other things, denies them inclusion in national labour laws and deprives them from accessing standard terms of employment, further increasing their vulnerability to the afore-mentioned risks.

It is in this context that UN Women is implementing its regional programme in Sri Lanka. The objectives of the programme are to contextualize the Standard Terms of Employment for Domestic Workers that both Sri Lanka and Countries of Destination (CODs) can follow as guidelines, strengthen the capacities of prospective women migrant domestic workers on following STOE, facilitate recruitment agents to adopt gender sensitive recruitment practices and train labour attachés on STOE and sexual/gender based violence.

As part of the programme, UN Women’s Sri Lanka Office seeks to hire a national consultant to develop a model contract for MWDWs from Sri Lanka. The consultant will review and edit the STOE[1] developed by UN Women and contextualize it to Sri Lanka. Towards this, the consultant will review the basic standards that need to be advocated for the Sri Lankan MWDW, analyze the existing contracts offered to MWDWs by the GCC countries/Countries of Destination, document good practices and review recommendations for improving existing processes. Stakeholders such as aspiring and returnee MWDWs, relevant civil society organizations (CSOs), the Ministry of Foreign Employment, Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment (SLBFE) International Labour Organization (ILO), International Organization for Migration (IOM), and trade unions will be consulted through interviews and focus group discussions.

[1] The template on Standard Terms of Employment for Domestic Workers can be accessed at: http://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/digital-library/publications/2016/12/template-on-standard-terms-of-employment-for-women-migrant--domestic-workers

Duties and Responsibilities

Objectives of the Assignment:

The main objective of the assignment is to develop a model contract for women migrant domestic workers.

Scope of Work:

Under the supervision of the UN Women National Migration officer, Sri Lanka and the overall guidance of the Regional Migration Manager, the consultant will,

• Conduct an analysis of the current contracts offered to Sri Lankan WMDWs by different countries of destination, study the best practices and terms that need to be improved to develop a standard contract;
• Conduct field visits and discussions with the government, International Organizations (IOs), CSOs and Trade Unions and MDWDs to formulate the template;
• Develop a model contract for WMDWs based on the stakeholder inputs and analysis.

Target audience:  

The model contract will support the following actors to promote the rights of WMDWs:

• Government officials negotiating Bilateral Agreements (BLAs) and Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the CODs;
• Prospective and returnee migrant workers and their families when negotiating their contracts;
• Recruitment agencies/agents;
• CSOs and IOs working for the promotion of rights and contracts for women migrant workers.

Key tasks:

• Develop an inception report including proposed methodology and timeline;
• Undertake research in line with the agreed methodology including literature review and analysis of consultation with key partners involved with current BLAs and MOU with CODs, and employment contract of women migrant workers;
• Conduct field research including focus group discussions and informant interviews with CSOs and MWDWs to assess/evaluate vulnerabilities caused by lack of specific terms outlined in the employment contracts;
• Develop a model contract that incorporates selected articles from UN Women STOE template [1]that is relevant to Sri Lankan context;
• Submit the analysis and model contract for comments to the Ministry of Foreign Employment, Sri Lanka Bureau of Foreign Employment, ILO, IOM, Swiss Development Cooperation, CSOs and Trade Unions for comments;
• Incorporate comments from UN Women and other key stakeholders;
• Submit revised versions of the analysis and the contract;
• Submit the final copies in a PDF and in editable form (e.g. Illustrator/In design/power-point/word).

Deliverable Deadlines:

• Submit the inception report – 30 November 2017
• Submit the first draft of the analysis - 15 December 2017
• Submit the first draft of the model contract – 15 December 2017
• Incorporate comments from key stakeholders gathered during reviews and the validation workshop respectively –  20 January 2017
• Submit the final draft of the analysis and the model contract –  10 February 2017.

 Institutional Arrangements:

The consultant will report to the National Migration officer, Sri Lanka and the Regional Migration Manager, Thailand.

Competencies

Corporate Competencies:

• Demonstrates commitment to UN Women’s mission, vision and values;
• Displays cultural, gender, religion, race, nationality and age sensitivity and adaptability.

Functional Competencies:

Knowledge Management and Learning:

• Shares knowledge and experience;
• Actively works towards continuing personal learning, acts on learning plan and applies newly acquired skills.

Development and Operational Effectiveness:

• Ability to perform a variety of specialized tasks related to design, planning and implementation of programme, managing data, reporting;
• Ability to provide input to and use new IT based systems.

Leadership and Self-Management:

• Focuses on result for the client and responds positively to feedback;
• Consistently approaches work with energy and a positive, constructive attitude;
• Remains calm, in control even under pressure;
• Demonstrates openness to change and ability to manage complexities;
• Good understanding of gender and development in South Asia;
• Demonstrable ability to work in a team;
• Ability to work under pressure;
• Good writing and communication skills;
• Excellent computer literacy and skills.

Required Skills and Experience

Education:

• Master’s Degree in Law, Human Rights/Women’s Rights, Labor Rights/Labor Law and other related fields.

Qualifications:

• Substantial Knowledge of or background on gender and labor migration, women’s rights/labor rights, labor laws and contracts
• Understanding on labor migration and development process in Sri Lanka;
• Minimum 5 years of proven experience in developing content and design of knowledge products/ information, education and communication;
• Proven experience on preparing knowledge products for trainings/developing understandable reading materials, handouts and presentations;
• Computer literacy and ability to effectively use office technology equipment, ability to use Internet and email.
• Ability to use lay out software (e.g. Illustrator, Photoshop, in design, PageMaker, etc.).

Language:

• Strong command in English, Sinhala both written and oral and ideally Tamil.

Schedule of payment:

Instalments                     

50% of instalment upon submission of first draft of the analysis and first draft of the model contract 

50% of instalment upon submission and approval from UN Women of the four knowledge products and the post-test evaluation report

Application Process:

Interested applicants should apply to this announcement through UNDP jobs site: jobs.undp.org

Interested individual consultants must submit the following documents/information to demonstrate their qualifications in one single PDF document:

• All applications must include (as an attachment) the completed UN Women Personal History form (P-11) which can be downloaded from http://asiapacific.unwomen.org/en/about-us/jobs;
• Kindly note that the system will only allow one attachment, please combine all your documents into one (1) single PDF document. Applications without the completed UN Women P-11 form will be treated as incomplete and will not be considered for further assessment;
• Applications received after the close date will not be accepted;
• Only short-listed candidates will be contacted.
• Please include a writing sample of ten pages or less of a relevant brief/report or a training tool in written.  

Payment will be on a lump sum basis and the selected candidate will be expected to start as soon as the contract is signed. Please note that we cannot consider applications without a completed P11.

Evaluation and Selection Criteria

Criteria for shortlisting of CVs will be based on the following assessment:

• Required Degree and Qualification (5 points);
• Demonstrable experience relevant to the assignment (10 points);
• Working knowledge and experience of working on Gender & labour Migration (5 points).

The evaluation process for selection of the candidate will be based on the following assessment:

• Interview
• Writing Sample

Note:

In July 2010, the United Nations General Assembly created UN Women, the United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women. The creation of UN Women came about as part of the UN reform agenda, bringing together resources and mandates for greater impact. It merges and builds on the important work of four previously distinct parts of the UN system (DAW, OSAGI, INSTRAW and UNIFEM), which focused exclusively on gender equality and women’s empowerment.