Domestic workers who are exploited or treated like slaves by foreign diplomats in Canberra face “unparalleled barriers” to escaping or seeking help, support workers say.

The Salvation Army Freedom Partnership says it helps about three individuals a year who are facing exploitation, mistreatment or slave-like conditions in diplomatic missions in Australia.

In one example cited by the Freedom Partnership to a Senate inquiry, a live-in housekeeper was recruited to work for a foreign diplomat on a written contract that promised $2,150 per month for 40 hours per week.

When she arrived in Australia, the conditions were dramatically different.



Her passport was taken by her employer and she was forced to work seven days a week, according to the submission. She was not allowed out of the home and was paid less than her contract promised.

The woman said she felt like a prisoner, and said her employer had told her she was being watched by cameras, and that her family in her home country may be at risk.

“I’m not allowed to talk, I’m not allowed to go out, even throwing out the rubbish,” the worker said, according to the Freedom Partnership.

The unique circumstances of diplomatic missions can place workers in highly vulnerable positions, while making it difficult for them to seek outside help.



Diplomatic immunity complicates investigations by law enforcement, and the isolation and precarious visa situation of workers deters them from making complaints.

Heather Moore, Freedom Partnership’s national policy coordinator, said there is currently no safe, direct avenue for domestic workers to report abuse or mistreatment to outside services.

Moore said it generally required “the stars to align” for a domestic worker to connect with a support service.

She said the referrals her organisation had received were, in some cases, “horrific”.

“From not being fed, not being given private living quarters,” Moore said. “We’ve had a client who had to sleep in a storeroom.”

Sexual abuse was a common complaint, Moore said.

The main option available is to complain to their employer directly – which brings obvious difficulties – or to the Australian Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade.

The workers often see the department as compromised.

“Many of these workers, if not all of them, are coming from life circumstances where people with money, people in government, people in positions of authority work together against people like them,” Moore said.

“If Dfat is the only place for them to go assistance, many of them will not do that, because they will not see Dfat as being independent from their employer.”



Julie Bishop, the foreign affairs minister, said the government treated allegations of worker mistreatment by foreign diplomats very seriously and as a matter for the police.

“The Australian government has strict procedures and checks to ensure foreign diplomats comply with Australian laws and regulations when they bring privately employed staff to work in their households,” Bishop said.

Moore has been lobbying the federal government to set up a direct link between independent support services and workers in the diplomatic community.

“They simply face unparalleled barriers to leaving situations of severe exploitation and possible slavery-like conditions,” Moore said.



“All the onus is on the worker to help themselves, without a great amount of reassurance that, should they take that risk, things will work out for their own benefit.”

The ABC’s Four Corners program will explore the exploitation and mistreatment of diplomatic workers in an episode to be aired on Monday night.