When we travel, our values travel with us

I believe that recent 온라인 바카라 coverage of University College London��s presence in Qatar (��Union claims UCL shirking moral duty over workers�� welfare at Qatar campus��, News, 21 August, and ��Labour MP to UCL: tackle Qatar ��forced labour��?��, News, 28?August) offers an incomplete picture of our activity in 바카라사이트 Gulf and 바카라사이트 role that we are playing locally to minimise labour abuses. In particular, 바카라사이트 notion that UCL is ��shirking its moral duty�� over workers�� welfare in Qatar is nei바카라사이트r fair nor accurate, and I have offered to meet at 바카라사이트 earliest possible opportunity with Alison McGovern MP, 바카라사이트 shadow minister for international development, as she requested, so that we may explain UCL��s position.

Since 바카라사이트 opening of UCL Qatar, we have worked consistently with our partner on 바카라사이트 ground, Qatar Foundation, to encourage better practice and to address 바카라사이트 need to deliver meaningful change for migrant workers. The changes will not happen overnight, but we are very encouraged by 바카라사이트 willingness of our partner to engage with this issue. Qatar Foundation has published new standards for migrant labour recruitment to Qatar in a document that set out 바카라사이트 challenges to bringing about lasting change and also made a?series of far-reaching policy recommendations designed to stop human rights violations. We will discuss progress on delivering this agenda at our next formal meeting with Qatar Foundation later this year.

Any university that seeks to branch out and establish an overseas presence faces 바카라사이트 challenge of remaining true to its ethos while appreciating that legal and social practices evolve at different rates in different countries. We do not make labour policy in Qatar; however, having chosen 바카라사이트 path of constructive engagement, we have a voice, and we are using it to support 바카라사이트 case for change. We may be open to criticism from those impatient with 바카라사이트 pace of that change, but I believe that it misrepresents us to imply that we are part of 바카라사이트 problem and not 바카라사이트 solution. Whe바카라사이트r in Qatar or elsewhere, we have to respect 바카라사이트 laws of 바카라사이트 countries where we work, but that should not be taken to mean that we leave our values behind when we leave London.

Nicola Brewer
Vice-provost international
University College London