State move to ban migrant mothers raises storm of protests

By Dharshini Seneviratne Head/Research (Save the Children in Sri Lanka)

A recent decision by the government to ban mothers with children below five years from working overseas has drawn a lot of flak from migrants rights and human rights groups saying the decision was hasty and raises issues like will these women be given a job in Sri Lanka. Here are excerpts of statements from Save the Children and the Migrant Services Centre (MSC):

Restrictions on mothers’ migration: Do they protect children’s rights?

While social costs of this absence are undeniable, if the root cause of poverty is not addressed, the children’s wellbeing will never be addressed in the fullest sense. Picture shows a group of migrant workers.

While this decision has been taken with good intentions and the perceived best interests of children in their early years in mind, the Save the Children, as an organisation working for the rights of children, feels that this decision overlooks several critical concerns.
It doesn’t address the root causes of women’s migration for work abroad. It also overlooks State and family responsibilities of providing support to children without adequate parental care, the lack of proper care plans for these children, and the dearth, and poor quality, of child protection services available. Having these mechanisms in place is a duty vested on the State and families by the Child Rights Convention.

Children’s rights cannot be ensured by the restriction of women’s rights to choice of employment. Neither can it be ensured by taking away from families the ability to decide what they perceive as best for the wellbeing of its members. This restrictive decision, if implemented, is going to impact mostly mothers from the poorest segments of society from where women often migrate for semi-skilled and unskilled work. This could affect around 100,000 women or more. The continued poverty of these families resulting from this restriction could quite likely put children at even greater risk than the actual absence of the mother. While social costs of this absence are undeniable, if the root cause of poverty is not addressed, the children’s wellbeing will never be addressed in the fullest sense.

It is not clear that the State has really investigated why these women are going abroad, or what the gaps in their lives are that they are trying to fill. Were women’s groups, grassroots women, women working abroad who have very young children, children themselves, and other stakeholders, consulted before such a cabinet decision was made?

It is evident from the recent Save the Children research titled Left Behind, Left Out: The Impact of Mothers’ Migration on Work Abroad (which studied 1200 families of Sri Lanka’s migrant women), that children understand the fact that their mothers often go abroad for the sake of the children themselves; to give them a better future, to see them grow up with benefits they themselves didn’t have in their own childhood. As one sixteen old boy said during the research “My mother’s absence makes me sad and lonely, but she went abroad for our own good.” And this applies to very young children as well.

Clearly, the impact of the absence of the mother on younger children are seen to be serious as demonstrated by the research; over 22% of children under the age of six showed loss of appetite after the departure of the mother, and nearly 50% of children were under five years of age at the time of the mother’s first departure.

These are critical findings that need to be addressed. But there is another side to the coin. Even though 22% of children suffered from appetite loss, these negative impacts were also due to the specific family contexts within which children were left behind, and the lack of planning for and sensitivity about the care of children left behind. If the primary caregiver was over sixty for example, the likelihood of negative impacts on children were greater, and if the father used physical punishment on children during the absence of the mother, the possibility of negative effects were again greater, according to research findings.

Children who got positive nurturing from father, grandmother or aunt, including very young children, were happy with the role of caregivers, and in fact led happy lives in spite of the absence of the mother. So what is key in these contexts are that families are supported to ensure that children are provided with a nurturing environment while mothers are abroad, rather than placing restrictions on this critical family decision.

What is even more urgently needed is to support parents to make informed decisions. There is a need to highlight to parents the potential dangers of leaving younger children without maternal support, persuading them to stay as long as possible with very young children before the decision to migrate.

If all else fails, and migration is still seen as the only option by the family, social care services need to constructively support mothers and fathers of very young children to leave behind a supportive, nurturing environment for the child in his or her critical growing years. There are stronger concerns for children under three years of age, but we do not feel that these are addressed through restrictive policies. The country’s childcare services and the Sri Lanka Foreign Employment Bureau have to all join hands in such processes to ensure the country’s, and these families’ economic health and general wellbeing.

What these restrictive policies hide is the real gap in both the capacity of immediate and extended families, and with State and non-State protection structures, to support children without the long-term care of both parents. According to the Save the Children research, families of migrant women had no access to public social care services in 97% of the cases, and in 95% of the cases, they were not even aware of what services were available to them. This is a clear lapse in service delivery given that several State institutions are mandated to protect children in difficult situations.

The research found that 50% of caregivers who became the child’s primary caregiver were grandmothers, and that only 25% of fathers were primary caregivers of children after women departed on work abroad. How are we as a country, responding to the needs of these caregivers? How can this new social phenomenon of large scale female migration be addressed at thelevel of the family, and through public social care services? It may seem a difficult task, but not undoable.

The cabinet decision is also based on a premise that women are automatically, by virtue of being child-bearers, the primary responsibility holders for childcare. The Child Rights Convention on the other hand, stresses the role of both mothers and fathers in childrearing. Why cannot a father give additional support to the child in the absence of the mother, as much as a mother often gives additional support, including working within the country, when fathers are abroad or have migrated to cities for work?

How can the state look at supporting fathers to become better childcare givers, and make them feel they are supported?

The Save the Children research highlighted specific needs of fathers; they adjusted reasonably well to the changing household and childcare roles, and showed higher acceptance of childrearing and household roles compared to fathers in families where the mothers were in Sri Lanka. However, these fathers showed higher stress levels than fathers whose wives were in Sri Lanka and consequently there were higher levels of alcohol intake among them.

What kind of constructive community-based support mechanisms can be set in place for these fathers so that their stresses are minimized, so that they feel supported, and they can support their children better?

Older women (grandmothers), who formed 50% of principal caregivers, had their own medical issues, and vast generation gaps to deal with when providing for children left behind. How can the needs of these older women be addressed? How can community care systems support these women and minimize their burden?Another key finding of the research was that education achievements of children of migrant mothers were significantly lower than those of children with mothers in Sri Lanka. Families need to be supported in addressing educational needs in the absence of the mother. How can schools provide a better supportive environment for these children? The commendable work done by the Sri Lanka Foreign Employment Bureau in this regard can be strengthened and replicated.
The government has made a valuable statement that mothers not going abroad for employment will be provided with livelihoods support within the country.
If success is envisaged of such proactive alternative employment policies, then the restriction on women with children below five would be redundant, as women will almost always automatically opt for local employment opportunities.
Policies in this sense should provide positive reinforcement rather than be restrictive in nature.
Restrictions can also lead to attempts at circumventing limitations set by policy. This could result in migration of women through unregistered means, increasing risks to their own safety and security in host countries, having clear links to the wellbeing of the children left behind.
Considering the above factors, Save the Children appeals to decision makers …

1. To reconsider the cabinet decision placing restrictions on mothers of young children from working abroad.
2. To implement strong positive policies to promote local employment opportunities for women to ensure that women stay in Sri Lanka.
3. To strengthen local child protection mechanisms to support families with children making decisions to migrate by
a. Helping families to make informed decisions that prioritize children’s welfare when contemplating migrating for work abroad. If the decision is made to work abroad ensuring child care plans are in place before migration.
b. Developing specific programmes for fathers and older caregivers taking it into account their respective needs in child care and family management.