Dionne Rose, Staff Reporter

The Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Secretariat is moving towards establishing legislation which will secure equal rights for the spouses and dependents of Caribbean migrants who travel across the region for work.

Robert Miller, head of the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) Unit at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, told The Gleaner that contingent rights in recent times has become an issue of concern.

"The absence of identified rights contingent on free movement of persons and movement of capital and establishment, has raised concerns and ... could inhibit ... the right to move," he said.

Mr. Miller said while the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas establishing CARICOM, has spoken to the rights entitled to persons who are eligible to move freely throughout the region, it was silent on the rights and benefits to which spouses and dependents of the migrants are entitled.

"They (the spouses and dependents) have already the right to travel, to enter and leave the jurisdiction in which the right of free movement is exercised by the principal migrants," he said. "It says nothing about what they are entitled to and they have ran into problems with this. So this is now getting attention."

Study on the matter

As a result, the CARICOM Secretariat engaged a consultant to carry out empirical study on the matter.

The consultant, ProfessorElizabeth Thomas-Hope, a Jamaican and an expert on migration, who conducted the study over a six-month period, will present the findings at a meeting today in Georgetown, Guyana, where Carib-bean representatives will further discuss the matter.

Professor Thomas-Hope, who is also the James Seivwright Moss-Solomon Senior Professor of Environmental Management at the University of the West Indies, Mona, told The Gleaner that the study looked at trends in migration in the region, work permits issued and the CARICOM skills certificates.

It also looked at the current policies and practices throughout the region relating to all aspects that could potentially affect the contingent rights of migrants.

These include those related to services such as education, health care, public housing and social welfare and ownership of lands and properties.

The study was conducted through interviews across the 13 member states.

dionne.rose@gleanerjm.com