Late last year, the Coalition for Fair Labor (CFL) issued a statement regarding NYU Abu Dhabi’s new Supplier Code of Conduct (SCC), now the only public document governing labor at NYUAD. In December, NYUAD and Tamkeen, its government partner, published a reply to our concerns. In response to the CFL statement, NYUAD and its government partner Tamkeen have made it a contractual obligation for any NYUAD supplier to inform workers of their rights. Also in response to the CFL statement, NYUAD and Tamkeen have announced that Impactt, the monitor commissioned to oversee labor compliance, will issue quarterly reports on its field audits of worker conditions. These are both significant improvements to workers’ rights. However, there are several outstanding issues raised in the CFL statement that the NYUAD response does not adequately address.
Here is the full statement from CFL in response to NYUAD. We hope NYUAD’s latest decision represents a new willingness on the administration’s part to solicit wider input into deliberations over its labor policies. Input has so far been limited to NYU’s formal government structures–an arrangement that proved to be inadequate during the pre-Nardello report of campus construction. Greater transparency could both help prevent the kinds of oversight detailed in the Nardello Report and, as seen in this instance, improve outcomes for NYUAD workers.
Coalition for Fair Labor at NYU 