Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Local Government) Share this | Hansard source

Thank you, Deputy Speaker, for your support. The paying of this one per cent levy on wages is ridiculous. You will see why in a moment. Anyway, he was willing to pay this $8,890 over and above everything else that he has paid to get this cheese maker into Australia. What happened is that Mr Hardy came back to me and said, ‘We can probably get this through if he agrees to pay two per cent.’ So now we have nearly $18,000 that Vincent Borrello has got to pay. When I asked why it was two per cent, they did not have any good reason why. They just said that two per cent might get them out of jail on this issue. So who do they pay it to? Not the immigration department. No, you have to find a registered training organisation to pay your two per cent levy to—that $18,000. Begrudgingly—Vince is filthy about the fact that he has to pay this extra when he had been shown in writing that it is one per cent—he is going to pay it. His business is going well enough to pay two per cent. But he cannot believe this arbitrary hit on him. He then goes out to get a receipt from a registered training organisation after he pays them this two per cent levy. He cannot find a registered training organisation in Australia that does cheese makers. That is the problem. So Vince is still fishing around Australia trying to find a registered training organisation. They think they have found one in Melbourne that he can give the money to. Can you imagine what this registered training organisation in Melbourne is going to say? ‘Why in the hell are we getting a cheque like this from a cheese maker in Western Australia?’ Vince would reply, ‘Oh, it is because that is the extortion I have to pay to get this man into this country under the rules of the Labor Party.’ It is shambolic and it is ridiculous. At the moment he is being held to ransom by this government’s policies. This government’s policies are absolutely out of whack.

We hear a lot from the other side feigning their interest in humanitarian issues. I have a Mr Harati in my electorate, whose daughter, Ms Samira Harati, is stranded in Malaysia. It is a sad story. Mr Harati wants to go on a hunger strike out in front of my office on behalf of his daughter. Mr Harati became an enemy of the state in Iran and as a result he had to leave the country. He came here on a humanitarian visa. His daughter and her husband left Iran with him and they ended up in Malaysia, where they made an offshore application. The Haratis cannot return to Iran. She became pregnant whilst in Malaysia. Her husband absconded with their child back to Iran and left her stranded there. She cannot go back to Iran and she cannot come to Australia. She has no means of support in Malaysia. The Haratis spent much of their time and much of their money going to Malaysia to try to help their daughter. So where is the humanitarianism of this government? I have written to two ministers about the Harati case. No help—‘just get in the queue’. When they came to my office and I told them that the minister said, ‘Just get in the queue,’ Mr Harati then said to me, ‘Well, why don’t I just get on a boat. Why don’t I pay a people smuggler $20,000 and get on a boat because then I will get a visa.’ We know that, of the 10,000 people who have come to this country by boat in the last 12 months or more, all of them bar about 160 have been given a visa—160 out of 10,000 have been sent back. And here we are with Samira Harati stranded in Malaysia. Where is the humanitarianism from this government?

The migration policies of this government are absolutely skewed all over the place. I have a case of a Ms Thivanka Liyanage, a Sri Lankan resident, who is seeking a resident return visa. She was here and went to Murdoch University in Western Australia from where she graduated four years ago with a Bachelor of Commerce. She gained permanent Australian residency soon after that and remained in Australia for approximately six months before returning to Sri Lanka. Why? Because her father was involved in the civil war there. He was one of the special forces commanders. She was there to support her family through that conflict. She tried to return to Australia to re-ignite her residency and they have given her only a three-month visa—and her family is here. Talk about family reunions! It is just crazy. It is another one that has been put the minister and put on the too-hard shelf. To his credit, I had a meeting with the minister and he was very polite to me and said he would do what he could to help. But nothing has eventuated on all these cases that I am raising with you.

There are so many other issues to consider. How about Francesco, an Italian who came out here on a visa with a business that requires his specialist skills. They have changed the ASCO. He has his wife and children here—they go to school—and they want to make Australia their home. They have changed the ASCO codes so that you can no longer have restaurant managers in the codes. Where is the fairness in that for him?

Then there is Nono, a Portuguese man who is in the same position. He is trying to get support but hurdles have been put in front of him. He is a fantastic person but he will probably have to leave this country in about 12 months time because he does not fit the box of the Labor Party’s new policies on migration. I will never know why you are absolutely hell-bent on looking after the rights and the interests of those coming here unlawfully by boat but you ignore decent people who have applied properly through the right means.

I will conclude by mentioning that I caught a taxi in Perth the other day and the driver was a guy called Kenny, a black African from Zimbabwe. Kenny came out here as a person who was involved in the flour-milling industry. He had the skills. He is now actually driving a taxi, and I cannot understand why he would rather drive a taxi than be a skilled flour miller. He said that he is so frustrated because he knows so many people in Zimbabwe who have problems with the Zimbabwe regime and they are in queues—

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