Journalistic prize awarded to Nina Corpuz for her article on the rise of human trafficking in the Ph

NOTE:  The attached winning article of Nina Corpuz is being offered to
recognized media for use free of charge.  Further information and details of the
next Turin course are available on request.

Filipino domestic workers between justice and survival, the article that won
the 2010 Media for Labour Rights Prize

MANILA - Kasambahay means *part of the household* in Filipino and this is
how domestic workers are called. They have poor rights both in their home
country and abroad and many fall victim to various kinds of abuses from their
employers and the agencies that illegally recruit them. Nina Corpuz investigated
about the conditions of domestic workers, the phenomenon of human trafficking in
the Philippines and the measures taken by the government to prevent it.

In the last year there has been a 20% increase in the incidence of persons
trafficked in the country for domestic work. The ILO Committee of Experts made a
direct request to the government to provide information on the application of
the law against this particular form of forced labour. Unfortunately,
anti-trafficking cases are often dismissed after victims decide to settle,
because they are offered money or they have to go back to work abroad. *It*s
really sad but it*s a matter of economic necessity, between justice and
survival, they choose survival* comments a Filipino State Prosecutor.
The ongoing Campaign on Decent Work for Domestic Helpers is now lobbying for
the adoption of the Batas Kasambahay bill in the Philippines, aiming at
uplifting and giving decency to labour standards of those workers. The ILO
considers domestic work to be among the most precarious of occupations and the
present job crisis is likely to aggravate those vulnerabilities. An item on
decent work for domestic workers has been discussed at the 2010 session of the
International Labour Conference with a view to the setting of labour standards.

Nina Corpuz, the author of the article *Filipino Domestic Workers: between
justice and survival*, won the 2010 edition of the journalistic prize for the
best story on labour rights, awarded by the International Training Centre of the
ILO (ITC-ILO), the training arm of the ILO.

The article was selected among stories written by professional journalists who
attended the training courses on *Communicating Labour Rights*, yearly
organized by the ITC-ILO. The courses introduce journalists and media
professionals from all over the world, to international labour standards, with
the aim of raising public awareness of their relevance to local labour and
social issues. The award ceremony was held in Turin, Italy, on Monday 21st June
2010 at the ITC-ILO.

The author

Nina Corpuz is a broadcast journalist for the Philippine's biggest TV
network, ABS-CBN Broadcasting Corporation.

She has been a reporter for 9 years, covering labour, education, health and
politics. She also anchors a television news program entitled *Balitang
Europe* (News from Europe), which tackles the concerns of overseas Filipino
workers in Europe. Nina also hosts a public service radio program and  she is a
contributor for ABS-CBN*s news website.