Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, if he will take steps to ensure that migrant worker rights are on the agenda for the next session of the UN Human Rights Council.

The United Kingdom does not intend to press for this topic to be considered at the March 2017 session of the Human Rights Council (HRC), as the HRC traditionally considers the protection of the human rights of migrants on an annual basis at its June session. A resolution on migrants in transit was adopted by consensus on 30 June 2016.

A resolution on the right to work is likely to be tabled at the March session, which follows the adoption in March 2016 of a resolution on the issue. While it did not reference migrant workers specifically, the resolution addressed a range of issues which affect migrant workers (as they do all workers). It also mandated the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights to report on the relationship between the right to work and the enjoyment of human rights by women. We expect the March session to consider that report. We do not know at this stage whether the resolution will specifically reference migrant workers.