Originally posted to The Guardian’s website, 4 October 2019
Your excellent, detailed article (Hundreds of workers dying in the searing heat of Qatar building boom, 2 October) highlights the opportunity for countries such as the UK, which strongly cares about workers’ rights and is a global leader on labour laws, especially health and safety in the construction industry. My meetings in parliament have taken a carrot approach to use the 2022 World Cup and the focus on Qatar as a means for pushing for labour law improvements. We’ve seen the Qataris very open in being a regional role model. They engaged with us when framed in terms of a constructive dialogue, while we also appreciate the difficulties they face. Another reason for this approach, something with which I am familiar, is the reliance on remittances by Indian and Pakistani female spouses in the home countries of those labourers. I do not want to see a diminution in those remittances.
This is in no way to “go soft” on them or any country when it comes to defending the human rights of the weakest. I hope you will extend your analysis to a regional campaign and cover Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates too. These countries also have extensive construction programmes and identical climates to Qatar.
Even as Qatar has faced a blockade there has been a strong will to improve in important areas like labour laws and working conditions; it is important that blockading neighbours learn from the improvements that have been made by Qatar. Our own analysis shows that in many areas of labour rights and health and safety, Qatar has overtaken its neighbours. However, we all agree there is still a long way to go.
Sandip Verma
Conservative, House of Lords; member, all-party parliamentary group on Qatar
• Fifa is responsible for the crazy decision to hold the World Cup in Qatar. The building boom is entirely caused by this decision. Fifa cannot wash its hands of the consequences of this: the extreme heat stress suffered by migrant labourers, the poor working conditions, the lack of adequate healthcare, that families of workers who die are not receiving any explanation nor compensation. Fifa should be called to account and urged to take action before more die.
Linda Rhead
Hampton, London
• Sebastian Coe defends the indefensible in attacking BBC presenters of the World Athletics Championships in Doha for rightly commenting on the practically empty stadium (Report, 3 September). As president of the IAAF, he must take much of the responsibility for the games taking place in such an unsuitable country. Surely a better policy would be to deny countries with limited human rights and gender equality the right to hold major sporting events until they reform?
Bernie Evans
Liverpool
Link to the original post: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/oct/04/the-carrot-approach-to-persuading-qatar-to-improve-workers-rights
