OTTAWA—The federal government has temporarily barred several embassies and high commissions from employing new domestic staff after evidence that workers were being exploited, documents reveal.

Foreign affairs staff are raising a red flag about the treatment of servants behind closed diplomatic doors in Ottawa and across the country after finding “workplace abuses and extensive labour rights violations.”

“Cases of domestic servitude in diplomatic households and all forms of labour exploitation of accredited domestic workers remain a challenge,” read a 2013 foreign affairs department report.

The chief of protocol office, which oversees foreign diplomats living in Canada, has stepped up its oversight of private diplomatic staff, saying they are a “vulnerable group susceptible to human trafficking and workplace violations.”

In at least two cases, Ottawa police officers are looking at possible criminal charges after domestic workers in diplomatic residences made allegations of labour exploitation.

In one of those cases, a worker made “serious allegations” against her former employees, an attaché with an unnamed embassy and her spouse. An investigation by foreign affairs staff found “broad-ranging abuses of Canadian labour standards.”

“The embassy remains under a ban on new domestic workers at least until the investigation . . . is finalized,” read an April 7, 2014 foreign affairs report.

But these are not isolated cases.

That same report reveals that five embassies and high commissions were all banned earlier this year from hiring new domestic workers and that several were repeat offenders, cited for “continued, consistent and serious breaches of Canadian policy.”

The concerns are detailed in the quarterly reports that track incidents involving the diplomatic corps based in Canada. Reports dating to June 2012 reveal that worries about the treatment of domestic staff is a constant theme.

In one case, diplomats of an unnamed country held nine domestic workers in “involuntary servitude” and committed illegal workplace practices, such as withholding wages, according to a December 2013 report, obtained by the Star under Access to Information.

The alleged abuses occurred despite assurances by the embassy that would “fully comply” with Canadian labour laws.

Foreign affairs officials reacted by barring that country’s diplomats from employing new domestic workers, apparently the second such ban in as many years for the embassy.

Foreign affairs reports reveal that in at least two cases, Ottawa police are looking at possible criminal charges

The names of the embassies and high commissions involved were censored in the reports provided to the Star. However, Montreal newspaper La Presse, which previously reported on concerns of abuse, said the allegations involved countries in Africa, Asia and the Middle East.

In early 2012, the department of foreign affairs slapped a temporary ban on the accreditation of domestic servants in the diplomatic households of two countries. The action came after the protocol office determined that servants in the households “have been the targets of workplace abuses and extensive labour rights violations.”

Those violations include unpaid wages, unilateral changes to employment contracts by the employer, excessive working hours and possible debt bondage, the report said.

Both countries were urged to educate their staff about labour laws in place to protection them and step up their oversight of employment contracts to prevent “exploitative labour practices.”

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However, the bans for both countries were extended when Canadian officials determined that workers remained at risk.

“Given that both countries have failed to demonstrate that they have established real, tangible and concrete measures aimed at preventing labour exploitation, the bans are maintained until further notice,” said a report dated June 17, 2013.

That same note also detailed how a domestic worker at a high commission asked for refugee status in Canada, alleging she hadn’t been paid, worked “very long” hours and endured “inadequate” living conditions.

Later in 2012, the government slapped a three-month ban on another embassy after uncovering “serious and systemic irregularities” in the employment contracts of domestic workers.

And the diplomat of an unnamed country was banned from the future employment of domestic workers because of “serious non-compliance” with an employment contract for a worker. The protocol office said that decision would send a signal to the diplomatic mission of the need to promote a “greater understanding of the rights, protections and legitimate needs of domestic workers.”

And it said the protocol office was increasing its efforts to deter exploitations by making more information available to domestic workers themselves.

Foreign Affairs spokesperson Ian Trites said Canada “takes all cases of alleged criminality by foreign representatives very seriously.

“Canada already has some of the most stringent regulations in the world on the employment of domestic workers in diplomatic households and is currently pursuing even tougher rules,” he told the Star in an email.

Trites said a country under a ban will have to provide proof that its existing domestic workers “are being paid on time and in full.”

As well, the country will have to put in place “sustainable and concrete measures” to address the rights of domestic workers.

According to a 2012 report by the foreign affairs department, there were 129 private servants working for foreign representatives in Canada. At the time, Saudi Arabia had the most, with a dozen private servants in diplomatic households.

The International Civil Aviation Organization, which is headquartered in Montreal, had 10 servants; Pakistan and Philippines had nine each; the United States had seven. Most of the household staff came from the Philippines, Indonesia and Pakistan.

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