We Are All Equal We Have Rights and Those Rights Will Change Our Lives By Maricar

I have been a domestic worker since November 2011, beginning my days at six in the morning with the steady dedication that has defined more than a decade of service. I draw my strength from hope, from the hope I hold for a better future, and on the hardest days, it is prayer that carries me through.

My message to the world is one I deliver with clarity and conviction. We are all equal. We have rights. These two sentences belong together. Equality is not possible without rights, and rights without equality are incomplete. What I am asking for is both at once: the full recognition that I stand on the same footing as every other worker, and that the laws surrounding my profession must reflect that equality.

I am completely hopeful that things will improve, giving that belief the highest rating. Every group around me, employers, government, public, and media, currently offers me only a little respect. That uniformity of partial recognition suggests a world that has begun to understand the value of domestic work but has not yet committed to acting on that understanding in a systematic way.

The rights I want restored are three of the four in VODW's campaign suite: the right to change employer without restrictions, the right to renew the Overseas Domestic Worker Visa, and the right to stay and settle in the country. I identify the inability to renew the visa as the most damaging loss, and rate the urgency of restoring pre-2012 rights at the maximum.

I consider all three of these rights as life-changing. Every single one. When rights are described as life-changing rather than merely important, it tells you that their absence is felt deeply and daily. I have been feeling that absence for more than a decade. The right to change employer without restrictions would mean that I do not have to choose between safety and stability. The right to renew the ODW Visa would mean continuity, planning, and the basic security of knowing that this year's work can lead to next year's as well. The right to settlement would mean permanence, the acknowledgment that after more than ten years of contributing to households and communities in the United Kingdom, I belong here.

I spend four hours each week worrying about my job and visa situation. Workers must speak up. Governments must make laws. Advocates must raise awareness. The public must be part of the movement for change. I do not limit this responsibility to any one group.

The government's current protection of migrant domestic workers I rate at the very lowest level. That assessment, combined with my absolute conviction that change is coming and necessary, creates the kind of determined energy that moves campaigns forward.

If these rights were restored, our life will change. Not might change. Will change. That certainty is the voice of someone who has thought carefully about what these rights would mean in practice and has no doubt about the impact they would have. VODW holds that certainty as motivation and as mandate.

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