Erwida Maulia, Jakarta – Sixteen years have passed since 40-year-old Rina (not her real name) started working as a cleaner at Jakarta's Soekarno-Hatta International Airport.
In that time, her job has not changed: she cleans airplane cabins and mops out departure lounge toilets and other areas throughout the airport terminal. Not much else has changed either, in her employment status or monthly salary.
Rina continues to supply the same contract labor that, despite years of working eight hours a day, six days a week, still earns only Rp 800,000 (US$86) a month.
As a contractor, she receives no lunch, health allowances or other benefits that permanent employees are entitled to, and even a minor slip up could lead to her dismissal at any time with no severance pay.
And Rina is not alone: She shares these conditions with hundreds of other cleaners working at the airport.
"I have to renew my contract every year. Toward the end of each contract, I always worry about whether they will still employ me. Of course, I hope they will," she said. Rina said following the annual tender for cleaning services at the airport, the winning company could bring in its own staff at any time.
Working as a researcher at a prominent state research institution for almost five years did not necessarily give Olivia (also not her real name) a better life than Rina's.
During the first two years of her contract, the 28-year-old received take-home pay of Rp 750,000 per month. Over the following three years, the amount rose slowly to between Rp 1 million and Rp 1.3 million, depending on the research projects she did.
Olivia said she held on at the research institution with the hope she would be promoted to civil servant status and have the chance to get a scholarship. But five years was not long enough for her to be rewarded with such privileges.
"I liked the research job. In terms of satisfaction, it was more rewarding. But with prices going up, my salary was used up for transportation. Nothing much was left for my family," said the mother of a 3-year-old girl.
Olivia has now been head of a laboratory for a private firm for several months.
According to the 2003 Labor Law, there are two types of outsourcing: human resources outsourcing and contract work outsourcing.
The Confederation of Indonesian Prosperous Labor Unions (KSBSI) said in its proposal presented recently to the House of Representatives' Commission IX overseeing labor, health and population, that human resources outsourcing should be banned.
"Those working in this field are usually kept on a contract continually with no job security and with minimum wages. And they're prone to termination of employment if they try to protest against their working conditions," KSBSI president Rekson Silaban told The Jakarta Post.
He said with outsourcing and contract labor practices not likely to be eradicated given the "current political reality", there should be measures to offset the negative impacts on outsourced and contract workers.
Rekson said the government should provide a better definition of "core jobs" and "supporting jobs" because different interpretations had resulted in "mounting violations of outsourcing practices that are and are not allowed".
According to the labor law, only five kinds of jobs can be outsourced: cleaning services, security, catering, mining support services and employment delivery services.