With the Chief Executive’s Policy Address fast approaching, the Hong Kong Labour Rights Monitor (HKLRM) today (15 September 2025) released a detailed review of the government’s “Enhanced Supplementary Labour Scheme (ESLS)”. The findings reveal serious regulatory failings and devastating consequences for local workers, prompting calls for the government to suspend all labour importation programmes without delay.
“Rubbing salt into workers’ wounds”
HKLRM Executive Director Christopher Mung criticised the government’s stance:
“Business closures are coming in waves. Workers are being laid off or forced to take pay cuts, and insecurity is everywhere. Yet rather than halting the scheme in the face of this crisis, the government stubbornly presses on. This is nothing short of rubbing salt into workers’ wounds.”
The Labour and Welfare Secretary, Chris Sun, recently argued that the two-year review period should be calculated from the date of the first approvals, meaning no evaluation would occur until mid-2026. Mung dismissed this as unacceptable:
“Every extra day this scheme operates is another day of harm for local workers. The government is reneging on its promises. The Chief Executive must give a clear answer in the coming Policy Address.”
Foreign workers imported despite rising unemployment
The report finds that, even as unemployment climbs, the government has pressed ahead with large-scale foreign labour intake. In the first five months of 2025 alone, 17,431 approvals were granted, which is almost identical to the previous year’s total, demonstrating a “wilful disregard” for Hong Kong workers’ livelihoods.
Introduced in September 2023, the scheme suspended the general exclusion of the 26 job categories and a range of low-skilled posts. By May of this year, a cumulative 61,058 workers had been admitted, averaging 3,000 per month, equivalent to an entire year’s intake under the old system. Of these, 30,896 fell into previously excluded roles. The catering sector is the hardest hit: migrant staff now account for 10% of its workforce, including 22,000 approvals for waiters, junior cooks and chefs.
In addition, the three sector-specific labour importation schemes for care homes, transport and construction have brought in a further 25,000 workers. Unlike the original mechanism, these bypass the Labour Advisory Board (LAB) and are approved solely by the relevant policy bureau. The adoption of “rolling quotas” has also inflated the numbers. In the construction sector, more than 10,000 foreign worker quotas have already been approved. When projects are completed, the quotas attached to those jobs are released back into the system and can be reassigned. As a result, over 8,000 quotas remain available for allocation.”.
Rising joblessness and wage suppression
Rising joblessness and wage suppression
The influx of imported labour has coincided with worsening employment conditions for locals. Hong Kong’s overall unemployment rate has risen to 3.7%, leaving more than 140,000 people jobless. The impact on specific industries is particularly severe: catering unemployment has increased from 4.4% to 6.4% (a 40% rise), while construction has leapt from 3.9% to 7.2% (an 85% surge).
Underemployment is also growing. Many catering and retail staff have been forced into part-time or reduced-hour contracts. Wage data shows further evidence of downward pressure: while Hong Kong’s median income grew 6% over two years, catering pay has stagnated, and retail wages edged up by just 2%. HKLRM warns that the official “median wage” benchmark used for foreign labour applications has effectively become a de facto maximum, dragging down pay across entire sectors.
Four systemic failures
The report identifies four “systemic failings” at the heart of the scheme:
1️⃣ Slack vetting and poor enforcement: The Labour Department now relies almost entirely on paperwork checks, producing a rejection rate of just 0.31%. Fake recruitment has been ignored for years. Once a complaints mechanism was belatedly introduced in 2025, 31 cases surfaced within two months, underscoring systemic abuse.
2️⃣ Zero transparency: Nearly 3,000 applications a month are waved through. The LAB has almost never vetoed a single case, and the voting records of labour representatives remain secret. The board, HKLRM warns, has become little more than a rubber stamp.
3️⃣ Exploitable ratio rules: Employers are supposed to keep a 2:1 ratio of local to foreign staff. But because this is calculated across whole firms, companies can place locals in back-office roles while filling frontline positions with migrants. A low full-time threshold of 35 hours—well below the local median of 43.4—also enables employers to split jobs, artificially creating new quota eligibility.
4️⃣ Weak penalties: Violators face only a one- to two-year suspension of new applications, with no fines or criminal liability. In one case, a Chinese restaurant called Top One Palace Club and Chinese Cuisine dismissed local workers to hire migrants, yet was merely barred from applying for two years, while its already-hired migrants continued working. HKLRM condemned this as “punishment in name only”.
Urgent reforms demanded
To protect local jobs and restore fairness, HKLRM is calling for:
- The immediate termination of the Enhanced Supplementary Labour Scheme and the three industry-specific labour importation programmes;
- A relaunch of public consultation to reaffirm the principle of “locals first”;
- Stronger penalties for non-compliant employers, including substantial fines and criminal charges for fraudulent recruitment;
- Restoration of vetting powers to the Labour Department and Labour Advisory Board, with mandatory disclosure of employer applications and board voting records;
- An urgent progress report from the cross-departmental task force on measures to combat migrant worker exploitation.
Full report: review of the government’s “Enhanced Supplementary Labour Scheme (ESLS) (Chinese only)