Identifying and Investigating Cases of Child Labour and Forced Labour: Training for Law Enforcement and Other Key Partners in Timor-Leste

Effective labour inspection, as a main part of labour administration, is vital in ensuring that the principles of international labour standards, including the elimination of child labour and forced labour, are implemented at the enterprise level and in promoting good governance in the world of work, making Decent Work a reality.

Background

a. Global Action Programme (GAP)

The ILO Global Action Programme (GAP) aims to build critical knowledge and capacity for accelerating progress against child labour and, where relevant, forced labour in targeted countries, with particular reference to the Roadmap for Achieving the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labour by 2016 as adopted at The Hague Global Conference on Child Labour in 2010.

The Project has interventions across three related components: (1) capacity building and strategic policy development (2) research and statistics and (3) protection of child domestic workers. The first component involves assistance to identify and address legal and regulatory gaps in the areas of child labour and forced labour, as well as to strengthen accompanying monitoring and enforcement mechanisms.

In Timor-Leste, interventions will take place in the first component, in particular in the area of strengthening, monitoring and enforcement systems. Within this context, GAP 11 will co-operate in organising the training of law enforcement officials and other key stakeholders on child labour and forced labour.

This sub-component will support national agencies to more effectively enforce child labour and forced labour laws and regulations and to enhance a culture of compliance in the target countries. This initiative reflects the recognition that an adequate legal and regulatory framework – in and of itself – is insufficient for ensuring vulnerable children and adults are protected. Support will build on the ILO’s extensive country-level experience in addressing child labour and forced labour through effective labour inspection systems, supported by solid enforcement policies in the following areas:
  • Development of a comprehensive and coordinate labour inspection system;
  • Strengthening of enforcement systems to better address child labour and forced labour through strategic planning and training;
  • Establishment of child labour monitoring (CLM) systems;
  • Establishment and/or strengthening of centralized and local databases and other mechanisms of filing complaints.


b. The South-South and Triangular Cooperation

Since the 1960s a technical cooperation within the UN system to enhance the social impact of development, known as the “horizontal cooperation”, has contributed to the beneficiary countries to master some techniques that can be transmitted to other countries.

Most of those countries that benefited from this learning process are now donor countries to the UN system and to the ILO, included Brazil that has learned a great deal from such cooperation. Over the past few years Brazil has been promoting horizontal cooperation in Portuguese-speaking countries in Africa and Haiti, sharing its experience and technical knowledge in tackling child labour. In 2009, Brazil concluded a framework agreement with ILO to finance projects in Paraguay, Bolivia, Ecuador and Timor-Leste.

More recently, in 2013, Timor-Leste and the other Portuguese-speaking countries, through their Workers and Employers’ representatives, signed a Bipartite Declaration, in Brasilia, to reaffirm their commitment to eliminate child labour within the CPLP.

Rationale

Effective labour inspection, as a main part of labour administration, is vital in ensuring that the principles of international labour standards, including the elimination of child labour and forced labour, are implemented at the enterprise level and in promoting good governance in the world of work, making Decent Work a reality. It helps to promote and ensure compliance with national legislation, and increases the effectiveness of employment and work policies preventing the conflict and promoting social peace. However, in a rapidly changing world of work, labour inspectorates often face significant challenges in carrying out their functions.

The Secretary of State for Vocational Training and Employment Policy (SEPFOPE) in Timor-Leste takes the lead in national efforts to enhance the local capacity to address child labour and forced labour, to ensure the integration of child labour and forced labour in national policies and programmes and to formulate action plans on the development and well-being of children and adults.

However, the SEPFOPE (through its labour inspectorate) lacks the capacity to effectively monitor unacceptable forms of work in work places. Labour inspectorate and other law enforcement services and activities of social partners are largely absent in the informal economy where child labour and forced labour thrives.

There is very little done in terms of inspections for the protection of legally employed, prosecution of perpetrators of the intolerable forms of unacceptable forms of work (e.g. human trafficking, forced labour); as well as the rehabilitation and proper mainstreaming of the victims. Occupational Safety and Health (OSH) is virtually absent in the formal and informal sectors. Social workers often are not capacitated to engage in the identification and referral of child labour as part of their usual work schedule.

Most ILO member States criminalize forced labour, either as a stand-alone offence or through related offences such as trafficking in persons, abuse of vulnerability and working and living conditions contrary to human dignity. The number of prosecutions and convictions remains low, however, for reasons that include difficulties in identifying victims and obtaining relevant evidence, unfamiliarity with applicable laws and a lack of co-operation between different law enforcement agencies and other governmental and non-governmental actors. There is an urgent need to improve identification as well as the enforcement of existing criminal and labour law provisions in order to combat forced labour effectively.

“Front-line” law enforcement officials, including labour inspectors and police officers, are instrumental in identifying forced labour. They need to be able to recognize the first signs of a potential situation of forced labour when speaking with a witness, or during a labour inspection or police raid. The successful prosecution of forced labour also requires an understanding of the different phases of investigation, and how to identify and gather evidence that will establish the forced labour offence.

In addition, more attention needs to be paid to the rights and needs of victims, requiring cooperation with entities such as trade unions and NGOs. There is a growing recognition that victims must receive effective protection and assistance in order to prosecute offenders successfully and avoid leaving workers in vulnerable positions where they may be at risk of re-victimisation.

Labour Inspections have the mandate to monitor all workplaces to ensure adherence to labour regulations. Labour Inspectors can therefore enter every work place to inspect and provide the necessary advice to employers and workers; as well as ensure that children and adults are not exploited.

Today, the role of labour inspectors takes on new importance with the introduction of new legal instruments such as ILO Convention no. 182 on Worst Forms of Child Labour and ILO Convention no. 29 on Forced Labour, both ratified by Timor-Leste in 2009.

To tackle hazardous child labour, inspectors can give information on hazardous child labour to employers and workers including advice on how to eliminate it. They can also use their legal enforcement powers in the workplace to ensure that:
(i) children are withdrawn from workplaces where hazardous work is taking place, and referred to appropriate social services (e.g. formal schools or skills training);
(ii) the health and safety of children who have reached the minimum legal age to work (15) are fully protected in the workplace. Protection can be ensured through a combination of general improvements in workplace health and safety conditions, avoidance of children carrying out hazardous tasks and economic conditions (salaries, allowances and other benefits).

A key strategy for sustainability and institution building is the capacity building for partner organizations in line with their key mandates and support to ILO constituents for the implementation of social interventions in matters relating to the elimination of the unacceptable forms of work to encourage social dialogue.

There is, therefore, every need to train labour officers, labour and factory inspectors, the judiciary and the Timor-Leste police and civil society to effectively monitor and enforce legislation prohibiting child labour and forced labour in both the formal and informal sectors. The GAP project seeks to promote in particular the integration of child labour into the work carried out by labour inspectors and other law enforcement agents by providing them with a training and technical support to carry out their functions.

Objectives


The terms of reference encompass the completion of one training workshop for labour inspectors and other law enforcement officials in Timor-Leste. The overall objective of the workshop is to build the capacities of the labour inspectorates, including labour inspectors, factory inspectors and labour officers as well as the judiciary and police to take action against child labour, especially with regard to hazardous child labour and child labour monitoring in the formal and informal sectors.

This course will also train participants to better identify and investigate cases of forced labour, including trafficking in human beings for labour exploitation. It will introduce forced labour indicators and will address different stages of the investigative process, such as victim interviews and gathering evidence, with a focus on the pre-trial phase. The course will focus on forced labour occurring in the private economy (including agriculture and domestic work sectors), but it will not focus specifically on victims of sexual exploitation.
  • The specific objectives are to:Familiarize participants with forced labour and child labour, explaining their conceptual and legal framework;
  • Increase participants’ understanding of child labour and forced labour and its practical manifestations, and help them distinguish it from other forms of exploitation;
  • Introduce participants to concrete indicators and how these can be utilized to identify forced labour;
  • Promote participants’ use of a victim-centred approach throughout the investigation;
  • Enhance cooperation between labour inspectors, police officers and other relevant practitioners by identifying effective models of cooperation.
  • Create a critical mass of trainers among labour inspectors, familiar with the ILO training manual for Labour Inspectors to be able to engage in training in the country with a focus on child labour and forced labour;
  • Empower labour inspectors and other law enforcement officers in Timor-Leste through a better understanding of their role, functions, procedures, planning and reporting mechanisms;
  • Use strategically labour inspection and other law enforcement departments for enforcing child labour-related principles and rights;
  • Validate the labour inspectors’ training manual and e-learning tool developed by ILO and identify in which ways it can be used as a reference tool for Labour Inspection with reference to child labour; and
  • Assist labour inspectors in undertaking training needs assessment, the preparation of simple tools, training materials including simple “Standard Operating Procedures”.

Taking into account the availability of the trainers and participants and the purpose for a full achievement of the referred objectives, the training will be divided in two separate but complementary trainings corresponding to each issue. Tthe first training will be on forced labour and be delivered by an expertise from Geneva on forced labour and the second one, on child labour, will be delivered by two labour inspectors of the Ministry of Labour and Employment of Brazil, with experience in labour inspections pertaining to child labour.

Outputs

The SEPFOPE and the labour directorates and other law enforcement officers and partners understand child and forced labour regulations, are able to identify and investigate cases on this two issues and monitors the implementation of the law.

Target Groups


Labour inspectors, Labour Relation officers, Police, Immigration and Coast Guard Officers, Employers and Workers’ Organizations representatives and NGOs.