Guest workers making up shortage, or fueling expansion?

August 22, 2008

The prospect of unskilled migrant workers coming to Tasmania might seem unfair and unnecessary after yesterday's announcement of job losses at the Cadbury chocolate factory but the fact is that farmers across Australia suffer from a chronic shortage of labour and have done for years.

In some areas, fruit has to be left to rot because not enough reliable pickers can be found. It is part of a wider labour shortage that is likely to get worse in the next few years as the workforce shrinks and the number of retirees swells...

Tasmania has bright prospects in this sector, developing niche markets in fruit and vegetables. Producers could take advantage of the guest workers scheme but only if they do it properly.

The article begins by discussing a labour shortage, and then ends with the tone of "bright prospects ... developing" i.e. a tone of expansion. The guest workers aren't even here yet and the program is already fueling ideas beyond it's purpose.

Migrant push 'a recipe for disaster' - Nelson

23/08/2008

"... Rudd is bringing in a massive surge ... at the same time as jobs are disappearing, a recipe for disaster." The Government announced a 20per cent increase in migration numbers in the budget, from 159,000 in 2007-08 to an estimated 190,300 in 2008-09, in order to deal with chronic labour shortages and wages inflation pressure.

The budget also forecast an increase in the unemployment rate from 4.3 per cent to 4.75 per cent a rise of more than 100,000 people, the Opposition claims...

"Why is it beyond the wit in this country, when we've got half a million people still unemployed, that we have to bring in people from Pacific island nations to do this work?" Mr Nelson asked yesterday...

Coalition figures point to Britain as an example of government mismanagement of an immigration program leading to a loss of public confidence in the system and an upsurge in racial problems.

Faith in liberal democracy to withstand potential ‘clashes’

August 22, 2008
Chris Berg

I admit to being very uncomfortable with those supposedly free market advocates who oppose immigration, for whatever reason. Too often the objections are so strained as to be suspicious. The idea that we should stop an individual from searching for work beyond the national borders of their birthplace simply because we believe that their culture is somehow incompatable with ours is a deeply illiberal position to hold. Our existing skilled migration scheme discriminates on the basis of education, and, by implication, wealth. That is, to my mind, already unconscionable; ‘liberals’ who propose further group discrimination on the basis of culture are even more worrying.

How does the free movement of people differ in any significant way from the free movement of goods or services? Surely we have enough faith in the strength of liberal democracy - and the persuasiveness of liberal civil society - to withstand potential ‘clashes’ of culture? The only concrete thing we ask of migrants is that they obey existing laws - and in this concern we already have an elaborate mechanism to monitor and assure compliance of all those on Australian shores regardless of their birthplace.

This is not merely apologetics. I suggest that not only is immigration practically beneficial, but we have a moral obligation to accept into our borders those who want to come. For individuals born in under-developed countries, simply crossing into the developed world can dramatically increase their potential salary, as well as allow them to experience the historically unprecedented living standards that we already enjoy.

The objections to expanded immigration seem nationalistic or economically illiterate at best, and immoral at worst.

Wow, Chris Berg sounds like a high priest of liberalism, a master of prostration, with an astounding level of faith in the persuasiveness of liberal civil society to prevent conflict. The free movement of people is no different from the movement of goods? Where does this faith come from? Does it come from history? Does it come from current affairs? Nobody knows. "Surely" you do?

Our nation better than One Nation?

August 22, 2008
Steve Lewis

Dr Nelson ... his populist stance against a Pacific guest worker scheme ... is outrageously shrill and just a tad racist. He's exhibiting elements of Hansonism as he panders to the lowest common denominator.

A guest worker scheme makes sense, not only for the positive effect it will have in easing acute labour shortages in the bush.

It should also pave the way for a pan-Pacific economic and trade pact...

Rudd's employment scheme, which will initially allow 2500 "guest workers" into Australia, is the first tranche of an eventual Pacific "common market"...

The smouldering mess that is Fijian democracy suggests a new Pacific path is needed to give nations a viable future.

Dr Nelson is barking up the wrong tree as he chastises the Rudd Government for putting foreign workers ahead of Aussies...

Offering Pacific islanders a temporary place in the Australian labour market is good policy, part of a new strategic vision.

Instead of playing the politics of fear, pandering to those who backed One Nation when its dumbbell leader Pauline Hanson was running amok, Brendan Nelson would be better placed offering constructive support for the Government's new foreign policy agenda.

The common market leads to neither Our Nation or One Nation, but to No Nation. The common market means the free movement of labour, as in the European Union. Regarding Fiji, what's the cause of that smouldering mess? The ethnic tension between Fijians and Indians. Indians who where brought there, ironically, as guest workers and then immigrants. Which is exactly where our guest worker and record immigration programs are headed - down the road of ethnic conflict. Steve Lewis and Labor will repeat Fiji's "smouldering mess" here in Australia.

Rudd tries to right Australia’s Pacific sins

18 August 2008
Hamish McDonald (Sydney Morning Herald)

For most of their careers, Rudd and like-minded others in our Government and society have been working to reverse one of the great wrongs of Federation, the white Australia policy enforced in the Immigration Restriction Act of 1901, the first substantial law passed by the Commonwealth Parliament.

In Niue, Prime Minister Rudd is expected to start redressing the other big wrong of Federation, in the centenary year of its completion.

This was the deportation between 1904 and 1908 of 7078 “kanakas” working on the Queensland cane fields, the remnants of the mostly Melanesian indentured labour recruited in the dubious “blackbirding” trade...

Rudd will start the process of getting Pacific island workers back onto the farms, orchards and vineyards of Australia, if not the highly mechanised cane fields...

This is a region we can help - and help ourselves - only by a more open embrace, a wider involvement, and more people-to-people contact. This requires us to overcome our phobia and see the Pacific as a human resource, and an economic extension rather than a drag for Australia.

It’s a world that will get harder to shut out anyway. The solutions of the 1970s that seemed to get the region off our plate - independence, liberation thinking, foreign aid - are failing under the weight of population growth, urban drift, unemployment, crime, corruption, disease and climate change...

But we need a more layered view of where the Australian home stops, moving incrementally to a more regional approach where Pacific people can use the “main islands” of Australia and New Zealand to lift their lives, through seasonal labour, education and some settlement.

Oh, so not only do we also have to say 'sorry' to the Islanders, but we do this by surrending our country to them as well. I see it now: for most of their careers, Hamish and like-minded others in our media and society have been working to reverse one of the great wrongs of Federation - Australia.

Fair deals a Pacific pipedream

21/08/2008

Labour mobility may be in the headlines but as Kevin Rudd talks the talk at the Pacific Islander Leaders' forum in Nuie, he'll have one thing on his mind; trade.

Allowing Pacific workers to plug the holes in Australia's labour market is certainly a priority for Australia's farmers. But the real gain for Rudd lies in the bargaining power the scheme will give Simon Crean as he moves into the second phase of the Pacific Economic Cooperation Agreement negotiations, the free trade agreement Australia and New Zealand are negotiating with the Pacific countries.

At $5 billion, annual trade with the Pacific is relatively small from Australia's perspective. But for most Pacific countries, Australia remains their largest trading partner. Its dominance in the Pacific, however, is increasingly under threat from Asia's emerging economies and most recently by the European Union's efforts to establish an economic partnership agreement in the Pacific.

In an area traditionally considered Australia's ''backyard'', this has caused some concern and made the agreement a key priority for the Rudd Government.

The Pacific countries, however, are wary of the agreement, and with good reason. Reducing tariffs will make it difficult for local producers to compete alongside Australian imports, especially on products such as textiles, clothing and footwear...

Using such a scheme to pressure the Pacific countries into a free trade agreement opposed to their interests is only likely to increase resentment in the region.

Northern Territory proposes own guest worker scheme

August 21, 2008

Australia's Northern Territory government has proposed its own guest worker scheme, employing people from East Timor...

Under the scheme, East Timorese workers would live and work in the Northern territory for six weeks a year, earning between US$14-16 an hour...

He says similar requests to the previous Australian government were ignored...

The association's president Tom Harris says previous attempts to recruit Aboriginal workers have not worked...

"They're really looking for long-term employment options within community situations."

And there's the heart of the issue, the employment is not within community situations. That is the real problem: farms existing without supporting communities.

Aboriginals and Abbott criticise guest worker scheme

August 20, 2008

THE powerful Kimberley Land Council says a Federal Government plan to import Pacific Islanders to pick fruit in rural communities is "shameful".

The council has thrown its weight behind Opposition indigenous affairs spokesman Tony Abbott, who says Aborigines will feel cheated when they see Pacific Islanders being paid to pick fruit while they languish on welfare...

"The kind of money which employers are putting up to bring them in and repatriate them would be much better invested in getting local Aboriginal people a start in the local economy," Mr Abbott told The Australian yesterday...

Kimberley Land Council boss Wayne Bergmann accuses the Government of taking "the easy option" instead of investing in its most disadvantaged citizens...

As Mr Mundine put it: "If you're going to fly people from the Pacific islands, what's wrong with flying people from Cape York, for instance. Or Karratha, or Melbourne, or Sydney, or Brisbane, or Nhulunbuy."

Guest worker program may be expanded

August 18, 2008

Pacific nations are queuing up to take part in Australia's pilot guest worker program but will have to wait at least 18 months before Canberra considers expanding the scheme.

The government has confirmed it will offer 2,500 visas to workers from Tonga, Kiribati, Vanuatu and Papua New Guinea to come to Australia for up to seven months a year to work in the horticultural industry.

August 19, 2008

For Australia, several industry sectors including transport, mining, health and aged services are experiencing shortages of high and low-skilled labour. The National Farmers Federation recently released a report restating its view that the sector requires an estimated 100,000 additional workers. The NFF has called for temporary entry for unskilled workers to fill an unspecified number of jobs (possibly 70,000) in industries such as horticulture. Given Australian demand for low and unskilled labour and the Pacific supply of young people wanting work experience and higher wages, one may wonder why there would be any opposition.

When you factor in the white flight from rural jobs, which will follow the arrival of guest workers, pretty soon you'll find that most rural jobs will be handed over to foreigners. Many white Australians will regard the rural industry as yet another no-go zone to avoid. The rural sector will become largely white farmers and their immigrant workers. Once again, the white community is left asking: is there any place to call home? Is there any native title for us? Social cohesion is bulldozed by economics.

Pacific Island guest worker scheme: 7:30 Report video

14/08/2008

Plans for a controversial Pacific Island guest worker scheme to address crippling labour shortages in Australia's horticultural sector, are about to be unveiled by the Government. The move has already sparked a backlash from some trade unions and the Federal Opposition, who say the jobs should be going to Australia's unemployed.

The video says that labour shortages are stunting growth and expansion. So is it a labour shortage, or a farmer greed problem?

Migrant workers - short-term solutions that make problems worse

July 27th, 2008

It seems a perfect solution. Australia needs workers for seasonal and mining jobs; The Pacific Islands and East Timor, with high birth-rates and much of their populations under 25, have up to 65% youth unemployment. Let their young people come here as temporary labour. Neat. Two problems solved. Temporarily.

It is a dangerous stop-gap for the Islanders unless also family planning cuts family sizes down to four or less. These islands have populations growing to the degree that their own resources cannot support them. The average woman in East Timor has eight children = 64 grandchildren = 512 great-grandchildren... The islands of Tonga, population 45,000 in 1950, are now over 100,000 in only 50 years. The Solomon Islands, in only one hundred years, will grow from just over 100,000 in 1950 to a million in 2050.

Guest worker scheme 'risks relations'

August 09, 2008

THE push to allow Pacific Island guest workers entry to Australia under a trial program risks antagonising Indonesia and The Philippines.

Opposition foreign affairs spokesman Andrew Robb said ... it could harm relations with Australia's southeast Asian neighbours... unemployment was rife in Australia's southeast Asian neighbours.

"Just what will Indonesia's attitude be if this leads to only other countries being able to send their young people, and not Indonesia, and not The Philippines, and not Malaysia?" he said.

"As a country, we have run a non-discriminatory immigration program for decades. Now if this one is going to just take people from certain countries, that's a fundamental change."

Gee, we're worried about relations with our neighbours, but not worried about relations between traditional white Australians and the increasingly diverse hoards of immigrants colonising our country.

Rudd scales back Pacific worker plan

August 09, 2008

KEVIN Rudd has dramatically scaled back plans for a controversial Pacific "guest worker" scheme amid concerns of a community backlash.

The Coalition has already raised concerns over the radical immigration plan, allowing islanders to work in rural communities for up to seven months.

But with unemployment on the rise, the Rudd Government has halved the number of participants to just 2500 over three years.

Bringing Islanders into rural areas will effectively turn them into no-go zones for whites. Ever since immigration has come into Australia, whites have moved away from it. This will just create another no-go zone. Here is a summary of problems with guest worker programs. When whites move away, this will create even further labour shortages, meaning that all rural labour will then have to be imported. If you destroy the white community, you then have to replace it with something else. We should be rebuilding rural communities, not destroying them.

Govt to push for trade deal at islands summit

7 Aug 2008

The Federal Government will use a Pacific Islands summit to push for open trade to help promote economic growth in some of the world's smallest countries, Foreign Minister Stephen Smith has said.

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd will join leaders of 15 other South Pacific nations in the tiny country of Niue for annual talks on August 16, amid concerns island nations continue to lag the world in economic development...

During his visit to Niue, Rudd is widely expected to announce a trial guest worker plan, to allow Pacific Islanders to come to Australia for seasonal work, in a major shift in immigration policy.

Guest worker scheme being snuck through

August 8, 2008

THE Federal Opposition has accused the Federal Government of trying to "sneak through" its Pacific Guest Worker scheme without consulting the public...

"There's been absolutely zero detail (on the scheme)," shadow minister for foreign affairs Andrew Robb told ABC radio yesterday. "Does Australia want unskilled labour coming in from a number of Pacific Islands given there are half-a-million unemployed people in our country already?" ...

The National Farmers Federation strongly supports the scheme, which would fill critical labour shortages in agriculture and horticulture. But unions such as the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union believe it will lead to the exploitation of foreign workers or "Mexicanisation" of Australia's job market and lower wages and conditions for all workers.MPs such as the Nationals' Kay Hull in the Riverina support the scheme, while others such as former immigration minister Kevin Andrews have doubts.

Andrew Bolt on immigration to fill labour shortages

May 17, 2008

But the real question is how are such people to fit in - in bad times as well as these good? How are we to give a future, a sense of community, to the Australians this Government is pushing out of jobs to be done by immigrants?

On those critical issues Evans has said not a word. We may well need more immigrant workers, but we need even more some policies and procedures to make sure we’re building a community, and not fracturing it.

Heart warming. Someone talking about community. Someone suggest we are actually more than just an economy - how radical. But such thoughts have been excised from Labor's vocabulary. They've gone the full global village. Non-discrimination, always and everywhere. They've gone the full colour-blind. To object to an economic need on the basis of immigrants' race or culture would make you a 'racist'. Labor has excised community from their soul.

Indonesia agrees to working holiday scheme

August 7, 2008

Immigration Minister Chris Evans said the two countries had finalised an agreement to establish a working holiday visa scheme, similar to one already in place between Australia and numerous other countries.

"This will facilitate the capacity of young people from each country to work and holiday in each other's countries," he said.

"I'm a very firm believer that schemes like this broaden the understanding of each other's cultures." ...

Under the agreement, Indonesians on holiday in Australia would be entitled to work for several months across all sectors, he said...

More Muslims on the loose. Unbelievable. What if their culture involves blowing us up? Is that the sort of understanding you want Mr Evans? Inch by inch, bit by bit, they are extinguishing white Australia.

How work visas help to enslave young migrants

August 8, 2008

MORE slaves are alive today than were shipped out of Africa for the Atlantic slave trade during the last millennium, says Kevin Bales, an American academic on modern slavery.

The professor of sociology and author of several books on the topic said global conditions had produced a market for slaves which continued to boom, including in Australia...

In Australia, they were most likely to be minors or young women, imported from poor Asian nations, working in the sex industry or as household servants.