Problem: Misleading and unethical recruitment of workers is a major human rights risk that is not adequately addressed by the AEWV scheme. Recommendations: • Government: Ensure effective regulation and standards for the ethical recruitment of migrant workers entering Aotearoa as a condition of employer accreditation. Policy should contain minimum recruitment standards that ensure the protection of human rights. These should provide effective deterrence and processes for enforcement that meaningfully protect against the payment or acceptance of employment premiums from workers. • Business: Do not accept free or unreasonably cheap recruitment services. Ensure you engage ethical recruitment agents by asking questions of the recruitment process and checking assurances. • Community organisations: Educate community members on human rights and how it applies to migrant exploitation. Discuss migrant exploitation at community functions and events. Speak out about employers who recruit workers who utilise unethical recruitment. 8.1.3 Tying visas to employers Migrant workers and advocates raised concerns about employer-tied visas. The AEWV scheme permits the worker to work only for the employer specified on their visa. The Commission is concerned this creates a power imbalance with serious risk for the human rights of workers. The visa settings, including the tied visa, work type and pay requirements impose significant restrictions on migrant workers, who lose their job, finding new employment. All this occurs for economically vulnerable workers with no access to unemployment benefits and other welfare support normally available. Workers reported that the tied visa employment plays an overt, as well as subtle, role in the power dynamic with their employer. For example, workers with few contracted hours and low pay struggled to afford food and rent. One worker said that when they raised this issue with their employer, they were threatened with having their visa removed if they continued to raise the issue. Workers cited having a tied visa as the most significant factor stopping them from raising breaches of their employment agreements or minimum employment standards. Workers reported that the power dynamic associated with tied visas could continue even after a worker stopping working for an employer. One worker who believed there was no justification for their dismissal was threatened that if they raised a complaint, or a personal grievance, the employer would advise Immigration New Zealand (INZ) they had stopped working and they would be deported. This created a subservient relationship to the employer and a dependency that lingers, even after the end of the employment relationship. Because of the constraints the AEWV scheme places on workers who have lost their job finding legitimate employment, these workers often turn to informal employment, which creates serious risks of adverse human rights outcomes and exploitation. The ILO has defined informal employment as “all economic activities by workers and economic units that are – in law or in practice – not covered or insufficiently covered by formal arrangements”.95 The Report of the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences, identified the following characteristics of informal employment: • lack of regulation or coverage by national labour and social protection legislation96 • jobs can be undeclared or unregistered97 95 International Labour Organization (ILO), in paragraph 3 of its resolution concerning decent work and the informal economy of 2002 96 A/77/163: contemporary forms of slavery in the informal economy - Report of the Special Rapporteur on contemporary forms of slavery, including its causes and consequences (2022). p6. Available from https://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/thematicreports/a77163-contemporary-forms-slavery-informal-economy-report-special. p6 97 Ibid, paragraph [17]. 21