The Migrant Empowerment Network in Taiwan (MENT), an alliance of migrant workers associations, staged a protest at the Labor Ministry on Monday calling for the abolishment of the manpower agency system.
MENT criticized the system saying that manpower agencies abuse their position at the expense of migrant workers and gave examples. One of them, Filipino migrant worker May, shared how she was able to find an employer willing to hire her directly after much difficulty. This would allow her to forgo expensive agency costs. However, her agency withheld her letter of termination which would allow her to change employers. What was worse, they reported her as a runaway worker which resulted in her losing her right to work in Taiwan.
MENT said that these cases are not one-time incidents and said there have also been cases where employers have been sued by manpower agencies for terminating the agency contract to go through a direct hiring route. They had to pay tens of thousands of NT Dollars to settle the court case with the agencies as a result. Again, MENT called on the government to take responsibility and change the system.