Engagement on labour issues
Initiative description: Engaging with entities responsible for the construction of, and provision of services for, infrastructure that is not being developed directly for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™, but will be used during the tournament, including transport systems, roads, ports, utilities and hotels. This will involve seeking to create incentives and exchange knowledge and best practices to promote fair recruitment practices and decent working and living conditions for their workers and supply chains in Qatar, including the provision of grievance and remedy mechanisms for workers who feel that their rights are adversely impacted.
As part of its scope, the Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy (SC) engaged with entities responsible for the construction and provision of services for infrastructure that were not developed directly for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™, but were used during the tournament, such as transport systems, roads, ports, utilities and hotels. This involved creating incentives and exchanging knowledge and best practices to promote fair recruitment practices and decent working and living conditions for workers and supply chains in Qatar. To learn more about implementation of the Workers’ Welfare Standards across the hospitality sector, please visit the standards for tournament service workers web page of this report.
The SC Workers’ Welfare Department (WWD) extended its advisory role to key stakeholders including Mowasalat, ASHGHAL, Qatar Rail, Accor and Match Hospitality, as well as FIFA and its commercial affiliates and member associations and also participated in several high profile international and local events to promote workers’ welfare initiatives, progress and legacy in the lead up to the tournament. The main objective was to help ensure that the lessons learnt about workers’ welfare and human rights for the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™ would be applied to future mega sporting events – supporting the SC’s mission to leave a legacy that outlives the tournament. Notable events in 2022 included panel discussions at the Concordia Annual Summit, the World Innovation Summit for Health (WISH) and the UN General Assembly’s International Migration Review Forum, as well as webinars conducted by the Centre for Sport and Human Rights (CSHR) that focused on human rights and best practices in the hospitality and security sectors.
The SC is part of two key hospitality working groups that were established to drive collaborations with hotel operators and develop best practices for this sector. The Hospitality Joint Working Group, comprising Qatar’s Ministry of Labour, the SC, the International Labour Organization (ILO), and the Institute for Human Rights and Business (IHRB), has developed a sector-wide guidance tool for promoting fair recruitment and employment for hotels in Qatar. The tool was launched in September 2020. The SC is also a member of the Strategic Dialogue Group that includes other national and international stakeholders with direct interest in this sector, working collectively towards addressing sector-specific challenges.
The SC WWD worked closely with the National Human Rights Committee (NHRC) and the National Committee to Combat Human Trafficking (NCCHT) to provide human trafficking awareness sessions for the hospitality sector. These sessions included discussions about relevant local and international laws and regulations, the composition, roles, and responsibilities of the NHRC and NCCHT in Qatar, as well as human trafficking examples and scenarios so that workers in the hospitality sector were informed of the immediate actions that should be taken in these situations and how to protect themselves and others. These sessions were attended by 15% of the front-line staff of the hotels on average.