We Have Rights and Those Rights Must Be Heard Protected and Brought Back by Noriya Adu Agsal
- thevoiceofdomesticworkers
- 6 minutes ago
- 3 min read
I became a domestic worker in August 2025, beginning a journey I approach with faith, family, solidarity with my fellow workers, and the knowledge of my rights. These are not just words I list. They are the actual pillars of my daily life, the things I reach for when the work is hard and the future feels uncertain.
On those harder days, prayer is what brings me back to myself. And in everything I do, I carry a message I want the world to hold. I have rights. That message is not complicated. It does not require elaborate justification. It is simply true, and it deserves to be said clearly and often until it is reflected in every relevant law.
I am completely hopeful that things will improve for domestic workers, rating that belief at the highest level. I also believe the world fully understands the value and dignity of this profession. The respect I experience from my employers I rate as a lot, which reflects a positive immediate working environment. The government and the general public offer less, but I see the potential for more.
The right I identify as most urgently needing restoration is the right to renew the Overseas Domestic Worker Visa. I consider this the most important of the rights VODW campaigns for, and rate the urgency of restoring pre-2012 protections at the absolute maximum. The inability to renew the visa is the clearest and most direct way in which the current system fails domestic workers. It removes continuity. It removes the ability to plan. And it ties a worker's legal existence to a single employer relationship in a way that removes any real protection or agency.
I also hold the rights to settlement and citizenship as very important, understanding that these are not separate issues but different expressions of the same underlying need: the right to have my presence in this country recognised and protected in a way that reflects the years of contribution I have made.
I spend three hours each week worrying about my job and visa situation, and I believe that governments should make laws and workers should speak up. Both actions are necessary. The law creates the conditions. Our voices ensure the law responds to the right things.
If these rights were restored, the word that comes to me is important. When the right to renew my visa comes back, I can breathe. When settlement becomes possible, I can plan. When citizenship is within reach, I am no longer a temporary presence in the place I have given so much to. I belong.
VODW's campaigns are about making that belonging a legal and lived reality for every domestic worker. My voice, new to the profession but clear in what I stand for, adds to the strength of this movement. Rights do not expire. They must simply be restored.
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