Australian Greens' Dissenting Comments on Interim Report
The Australian Greens thank everyone who made a public submission and/or public representation to this inquiry into Australia’s Skilled Migration Program.
The Australian Greens do not support the approach of this report.
The interaction between labour laws and migration laws in Australia are full of loopholes which allow for massive exploitation of local and overseas workers. Those loopholes need to be closed, but this report fails to take the necessary steps.
Further, loopholes in free trade agreements allow employers to circumvent local labour laws, which leads to the systemic exploitation of temporary visa workers and local workers being denied job opportunities and training. Australia must stop signing up to these unfair trade deals, but this report is silent on that front.
To overcome any labour shortages, skills training of local workers should be the priority. Instead of weakening labour market testing and undermining Australian wages and conditions as Recommendation 1 proposes, jobs should be advertised locally first and temporary working visas should be used to fill genuine skill shortages or where international collaboration is important (such as research).
Critically, temporary visa holders should not be automatically locked out of the permanent migration program. The system regulating the use of migrant workers should be negotiated between unions, employer organisations and the federal government.
Established Australian rates of pay should be guaranteed. Labour laws must be properly enforced to ensure that local legal standards are being applied everywhere, both for local workers and for migrant workers.
The Australian Greens also note Recommendation 8, which calls on the Government to reserve places on flights and in quarantine for skilled migrants. However, the report does not set out a timetable or plan to enable the urgent return of Australia’s existing skilled visa holders to Australia, which we believe to be a major omission, and failing.
Paragraph 2.68 of the report states that:
Australia lost over 500,000 people on temporary migration visas in the last 12 months. Many of those people were workers who were vital to Australian businesses. Many of the jobs these migrants do create jobs for Australians ...
Many of these people were not lost - they were locked out by Australia’s current COVID-19 border restrictions.
These skilled migrants have now been stranded overseas, separated from their homes, jobs, and families – including children – for around a year. The Government’s response to many of their applications for a travel exemption has been to suggest that if they are stranded abroad, and separated from their family, that their family should leave Australia and join them overseas – that their family should “go home”.
That is no way to treat people that we’ve invited into our country, to support and strengthen our industries and economy, and to build lives and make a home in Australia.
Many of these skilled migrants have lived in Australia for many years, working their way through various student and skilled visas on a pathway to permanent residency. Once a temporary resident is eligible for permanent residency, an application for a permanent resident visa can then take well over a year to process.
As such, Recommendation 8 should first be extended to the tens of thousands of skilled visa holders who are currently stranded overseas, with no idea when, or if, they’ll ever be able to return to their lives in Australia.
The Australian Greens further note that the existing quarantine, flight caps, and travel exemption arrangements lack transparency, accountability, consistency, affordability and timeliness. While reform of the above arrangements are outside the scope of this Inquiry, the Australian Greens believe that it is disingenuous to suggest to businesses or new skilled migrants that we are ready to invite new skilled visa holders to Australia while our international borders remain closed and in the absence of reform to the above systems.
The Australian Greens oppose Recommendation 12, which would provide automatic and fast-tracked pathways to permanent residency for wealthy investors and professional classes of skilled visas. As with family reunion visas, we do not support there being one pathway to permanent residency for the rich, and another for everyone else.
The Australian Greens believe that until these issues are acknowledged and urgently addressed, Australia runs the risk of losing skilled migrants to countries that are considered more welcoming, such as Canada and the United Kingdom.
Nick McKim
Senator for Tasmania