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Press briefing of Cabinet Decision taken on 2014-02-13
Proposed Agreement on Domestic Worker Recruitment between the Ministry of Labour of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Ministry of Foreign Employment Promotion and Welfare of Sri Lanka

- the Government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has given its concurrence to the draft Agreement to be entered into between the two Governments to protect the rights and safeguard the welfare of migrant domestic workers. Currently about 500,000 Sri Lankans are employed in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia of which 60% are female domestic workers. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia has entered into an Agreement on Labour Migration only with the Philippines and the second such Agreement was due to be entered with India on 03rd January 2014. Their third Agreement will be with Sri Lanka and the said Agreement is very similar in content to the Agreement entered into between the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and the Philippines. The salient features of the Agreement are -

* the employer should open a Bank Account for the domestic worker and deposit the salary monthly in that Account. The Pass Book of the Bank Account to be in the custody of the domestic worker;

* 30 days paid vacation in Sri Lanka at the end of a period of 02 years service. If the domestic worker is returning to the same employer, additional 01 month's salary to be paid;

* the Passport to be in the custody of the domestic worker; and

* recruitment to be done at no cost to the domestic worker.

The proposal made by Hon. Dilan Perera, Minister of Foreign Employment Promotion and Welfare to enter into the above Agreement with the Government of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, was approved by the Cabinet.