Minister "Urges No High Rise Window Cleaning" - Singapore

Dicing with death: A Singapore maid leans out of a high-rise window to make sure she does a thorough job.

Don't risk your lives cleaning windows, urges Singapore minister after 7 maids fall to their deaths leaning out of high-rise buildings: A Singapore minister has urged maids to take extra care after a spate of deaths of women falling from high-rise buildings while cleaning windows. Madam Halimah Yacob, Singapore's Minister of State for Community Development, issued the urgent warning after seven women fell to their deaths climbing onto high-rise ledges to clean the outside of windows.

A warning has been sent out to employers in Singapore, insisting that domestic cleaning staff do not have to clean the outside of windows in high-rise homes. Young women are often pictured taking their lives in their own hands by perching perilously on window ledges just to make sure they do a thorough job. Some simply lean out of windows while sat inside the building, but others stand completely isolated on high-rise window ledges with no protective equipment. The hugely dangerous practice has seen seven maids fall to their death this year in Singapore, with the latest fatality coming just last week.

Safety first: Singapore authorities have since demonstrated how cleaners should act, by taking more care and not leaning out of windows. Click to enlarge.

Madam Halimah said employers should drum the message into their cleaners about being careful while doing the windows. She said: 'Once they do that, I think, we will be able to save a lot of lives.' Madam Halimah added that the recent spate of deaths was 'very sad' as many of the maids were young women from nearby villages. She also called for maids to be barred from opening window grilles and employers to keep the keys to these grilles from their cleaners.

Singaporeans have been urged not to insist that their domestic workers clean the outside of windows in high-rise homes.

Latest Indonesian Maid Death Prompts Warning from Singapore Minister:  Singaporeans have been urged not to insist that their domestic workers clean the outside of windows in high-rise homes. Halimah Yacob, the Minister of State for Community Development, Youth and Sports, said on Sunday that there was no need for the outside of windows to be cleaned if they were already clean on the inside. She was responding to reporters’ questions about the seven Indonesian maids who had fallen to their deaths so far this year while cleaning windows or hanging out the laundry.

Speaking on the sidelines of a graduation ceremony for Indonesian domestic workers who had earned academic qualifications at the Indonesian School in Singapore, she called for maids to be barred from opening window grilles and for employers to keep the keys to these grilles from their maids. “They must constantly drum that into the maid’s head - that there’s no need for her to open the grilles, there’s no need for her to clean the outside of windows - and once they do that, they will be able to save a lot of lives,” she said. “It’s unnecessary death, and it’s really very sad.”

Halimah, who has spoken out several times about the welfare of maids and foreign workers, noted that many foreign domestic workers here are from rural villages and thus unused to high-rise buildings. “Having to work in such high-rise buildings is quite a nightmare for them, so we need to take extra precautions to protect them, without compromising the standard and quality of work at home,” she said. She said she was pleased that the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) was looking into the matter.

MOM is improving a compulsory half-day safety-training class for newly arrived maids, which will be part of a new mandatory settling-in program for them. It has also said it will prosecute employers who fail to give their maids a safe work environment. “They want to make sure that these incidents are not repeated because, frankly, there’s no need for our domestic workers to fall to their deaths. We just need to take precautions, particularly on the part of employers,” Halimah said.

Police investigate the death of a 34-year-old Indonesian maid who fell from a window in Singapore last week.

Young Armenian woman falls from window, dies (Yerevan) – An unfortunate incident occurred Friday in Armenia’s Abovyan city, Aravot daily writes. “Varduhi Petrosyan, 24, an Abovyan city apartment resident, fell while cleaning her home’s windows, and she died on the spot. She was living on the sixth floor of a nine-storey building. The neighbors told that she was married and had a small girl. In addition, according to the neighbors, she was pregnant. But this has to be either confirmed or denied by forensic medical examination. The investigation department is preparing a report on the case,” Aravot writes.