From a network to a federation

“We had two very interesting days here in Uruguay, days of political learning and leadership training. We learned a great deal from the experience of fellow workers and we realized that there was still one major step we had to take: achieving integral unity to better fight for our demands,” Bautista said.

 

“Up until now we were a network of scattered organizations, each acting on its own, without a steady coordination. Forming a federation is a huge step towards making our work visible, as in most countries we are invisible and subjugated workers. It provides a more formal labor unity, bringing us together as a single movement,” she added.

 

The congress, which was attended by almost two hundred delegates (mostly women, but some men too) from 55 countries, also adopted an action plan that focuses primarily on furthering the ratification of ILO Convention 189 concerning domestic labor, protecting migrant workers, which constitute a large part of the global mass of domestic workers, and eradicating child labor.

 

“These are general actions from which regional and national action plans can be drawn,” Bautista said.

 

“A problem we face worldwide is the need to make our work visible, as it is unacknowledged and marginalized by society and unprotected by government, and we need to create tools to organize ourselves.”

Latin America, a region where the sector’s workers range from 14 to 17 million, depending on the sources, and are in their vast majority women, has advanced in terms of “visibility and protection for this very special workforce,” she noted.

 

According to Bautista, participants at the congress acknowledged in particular the efforts made by Uruguay (the first country to ratify ILO Convention 189, in 2012), Argentina, Brazil, and Venezuela.

 

But there are others that “are lagging very far behind.” Among these the union leader included her own country, Mexico, which with more than two million domestics is one of the countries of the region with the largest number of workers in this sector.

 

“Mexico is preparing to ratify the convention, but it has not made efforts to disseminate it and it is has not yet adopted any laws. We have been presenting bills for more than four legislatures, but they haven’t even been put up for discussion,” she noted.

 

Bautista worked as a domestic for over 22 years, starting at the age of 14, and in 2006 she was named general secretary of the Latin American and Caribbean Confederation of Domestic Workers (CONLACTRAHO).

 

“México has to see all the progress achieved worldwide. I was surprised to see how all Uruguayans at the congress, from government officials to union members and workers, have incorporated the rights of domestic workers into their discourse, how they talked about issues such as social security, health, labor rights, and, especially, tripartite bargaining, which is key because it allows for the regulation of rights.”

 

 

“Many countries adopt public policies, but the legislation does not provide for the possibility of inspecting the homes of the employers to verify compliance. If Uruguay could do it, why not the rest? It’s the people who make the laws,” Bautista said.

 

“In Mexico, if we even start talking about employment contracts or forming unions we are met with a negative response, because contracts cost money and unionization is not for us, because we don’t work for the same employer. The same happens in Guatemala, in Honduras…”.

 

Only now, after the adoption of ILO Convention 189, is the labor movement as a whole in Latin America starting to consider these issues. “In Mexico, labor confederations are beginning to take us into account. We need their support to help us organize, sometimes we don’t have materials to distribute, we have no place to gather,” she said.

 

“The main thing is to convince our fellow workers. They have been made to believe that they have no rights, that households are not factories, that organizing can be expensive, that the only thing they know how to do is clean.

 

The result is that they are subject to all sorts of abuses: women who are fired after 30 years of work for no reason whatsoever and with no protection, who lose everything because they have given their life to others.

 

Physical violence, sexual abuse, gender discrimination, racial discrimination, being forced to eat the leftovers of the ‘family’ as if it were something normal: that has been the common denominator among domestics, and that’s what we want to end once and for all.”.

 

Mexico’s domestic workers’ union launched a campaign called “put your gloves on,” to promote the ratification of Convention 189 and advocate for equal rights for domestic workers, to extend all labor rights to these workers.

 

“We want all the world to put on gloves like this,” she says, showing a pair of green gloves that were handed out to congress participants, “until the law is passed.”

 

“Naturally we’ll have to overcome the resistance of some very wealthy legislators who have a large number of domestics working for them in their homes, whom they claim to respect. They say, ‘I treat my nana well,’ and some may actually treat them well, but others don’t. Without a law there’s no guarantee,” Bautista said.

 

And she added, “We have no one in Mexico who will tell us from above: ‘You have rights like everybody else,’ and who will enable us to say ‘I demand my eight-hour workday, my pension and my Sunday off (which is the day we work hardest because it’s when our employers rest).’ We only have ourselves.”