Every year, thousands of Ugandans migrate internally and abroad in search of work. Many face exploitation, unsafe conditions, including conditions of trafficking in persons and modern-day slavery amidst limited access to justice. PLA's interventions ensure migration becomes a pathway to opportunity—not vulnerability. And promotes safe, informed, and dignified migration.

PLA has been implementing activities in Katwe 1 parish, Kampala district that aim at prevention of child labour and protection of child labourers with specific focus on child domestic work. This has been through community empowerment, education and training. Under this project, 110 child domestic workers and children at risk of joining were identified during a social mapping and 45 community members were trained on the problem of child domestic work, legal provisions relating to child domestic work, children’s rights, CDW monitoring mechanisms and the strategies for prevention, withdrawal and protection of child domestic workers. The trained community members have held awareness creation meetings with over 700 other members.

Children have been an integral part of the project implementation and are actively involved in awareness creation through songs and plays and development of information, education and communication materials. They have also participated in project monitoring and in reporting cases of child abuse to PLA and other stakeholders.

In Lira, the child domestic workers have been trained and Peer to peer education is being done by the children themselves. This has seen an increase in the number of child domestic labour cases being reported to the office. PLA has also withdrawn 256 child domestic workers and sent them to school.

Platform for Labour Action has made great strides to alleviate the circumstances that a large number of these children find themselves in. The organization has worked throughout the year to prevent the involvement of children in work that is dehumanizing and harmful to their physical and emotional well being and to rehabilitate them through primary, secondary and vocational education.

• 227 female and male children have been removed from work they were engaged in, 150 of these were in high risk work environments.
• 76 of those that were withdrawn were placed in school and provided with the basic scholastic requirements of uniforms, exercise books and pens. 55 child domestic workers received protective services
• Additional aids such as sewing machines, hand held saws and hammers were also supplied.
• Mattresses and bed sheets and blankets were also distributed to those most in need
• 18 of the poorest families received grants for viable and sustainable income generating projects, which would enable them to make basic provisions for their children’s educational needs.

In 2004 PLA received accreditation from the Uganda Law Council to operate as a legal office. In addition to the support that Platform for Labour Action receives from outside counsel; Mr Angerett Sebastian of Angerett & Co. Advocates. The Practicing Certificate (PC) enables Platform for Labour Action’s legal officers to also represent clients in law courts.

In 2005, the Legal Department was able to attend to a total of 640 clients, 11 cases were carried forward from 2004, and 379 were new clients and 250 were domestic workers reached through legal aid clinic

A total of 120 cases were amicably resolved by the intervention of the Department through Alternative Dispute Resolution mechanisms and 199 cases were resolved administratively following service of demand notices on the employers, while 60 merited conventional litigation, and 13 cases were filed by the Department in various courts depending on the pecuniary prayers of each. The cases handled included wrongful dismissal, unpaid wages and terminal benefits and compensation for work related injuries. Our client base is comprised mainly of vulnerable, marginalized and undocumented workers such as construction workers, teachers, fuel attendants, bakery workers, casual labourers, market vendors and domestic workers.

In April 2005, the report on the key findings of the review of current legislation and policies in relation to children in commercial agriculture was disseminated. This report presents a summary to guide policy makers in making amendments to the relevant legislation and finding practicable solutions to address the problem of child labour in Uganda.

The department further provided legal advisory services, mediation and arbitration services and technical advise to employers and employees on the formalization of employment contracts. PLA has also made available to Community Based Organization (CBO’s) the procedures for assumption of a corporate legal personality.

The department has also hosted legal outreach clinic for domestic workers in collaboration with Children of Zion where 150 workers attended.

Overall Objectives of the Legal Department

1. Provision of Legal Aid Advisory and Support Services to Vulnerable, Marginalized and Undocumented workers.
2. Periodic analysis of national laws and policies to ensure compliance with International Human Rights instruments as well as the ILO (Core) Labour Standards.
3. Legal Education and Rights awareness for Vulnerable, marginalized and undocumented workers.
4. Workplace monitoring to ensure respect for employees' rights.
5. Technical Support to Community based Organizations.

Strengths

1. Approved and registered Law Chambers.
2. Limited Legal Aid Providers in the labour sector in Uganda.
3. Strong referral system with the Uganda Human Rights Commission, Legal Aid Project, Legal Aid Clinic, KCC District Labour Office and the Public Defenders.
4. Two Enrolled Advocates, with training in Alternative Dispute Resolution and human rights.
5. Networking with an established and renown labour rights lawyer, Mr. Sebastian Angerett, from whom the Legal Officers are learning quite a lot.