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Home Office

Answer

Mr. Drew: To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department into how many languages the leaflets produced for migrant workers, resulting from recommendations from the Operation Gangmaster, have been translated. [196757] Mr. Browne: Operation Gangmaster is a Government initiative designed to bring different Departments and agencies together to tackle abuses by rogue labour providers. This initiative has not produced any specific recommendations to translate information for migrant workers. However, the Government have been active in making translated information available and has had regard to recommendations previously made on this issue by the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs Committee, of which my hon. Friend is a member. Earlier this year, the Home Office produced a leaflet and guidance notes for applicants to the accession worker registration scheme in relevant languages. These outlined the details of the scheme and gave advice to workers rights. The Trades Union Congress also produced their own leaflet on workers' rights and the Home Office met the cost of producing translations of this leaflet in Hungarian, Estonian, Czech, Latvian, Slovak and Polish. In response to specific concerns about the mistreatment of workers, the Department for Trade and Industry (DTI) and the Foreign and Commonwealth Office have worked with the Portuguese community and the TUC to produce leaflets explaining the rights of workers in Portuguese. The DTI has also worked with the Polish and Lithuanian Governments to produce bilingual leaflets on employment rights for their nationals. These were launched in June.

Secondary information

Type

Written question

Reference

196757; 426 c2063-4W;426 c2069-70W

Session

2003-04

Subjects

Information Languages Gangmasters Leaflets Migrant workers

Link

View this Written question on www.publications.parliament.uk