oa Unskilled Labour Migrants in Qatar: Issues and Policy Developments

Much of the literature on migrants in the GCC has focusses primarily on the treatment of construction labourers who have relocated from mostly South Asia. Fottrell (2015). Okaz News (2017). Their plight has been published in many newspapers and journals and countries within the GCC have made some headway into introducing legislation to address the protection of migrant workers to bring about policy change. BBC News (2016), BBC News (2017), Piper (2014), Martin and Malit (2017), The Guardian (2017), Mohammad and Sidaway (2016). Surprisingly, stemming from the present Gulf crisis, there have been accusations by the blockading countries of abuses to migrant labour in Qatar. This applied, non-experimental and quasi-evaluative research uses both primary and secondary sources to conduct an investigation to obtain information about the issues of migrant labour in Qatar and the extent to which their problems have been addressed in terms of legislation. Wickramasekara (2015), Wickramasekara and Baruah (2017), Kamrava (2015), Ulrichsen (2009). The purpose of this work is to establish an evidence base regarding the issues of migrant workers and what positive actions have been undertaken to address the issues surrounding migrant management. It also aims to report on the effectiveness of the legislation and suggest possible amendment.