Pat Conroy (Charlton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I am pleased to make a contribution on the Migration Amendment (Charging for a Migration Outcome) Bill 2015. No Australian wants people who are working on a legitimate visa to be exploited. Australians have legitimate expectations that all workers will be paid Australian wages and enjoy Australian wages and conditions. The House will be aware of the recent coverage on Four Corners which revealed that the 7-Eleven chain was underpaying its workers in more than 600 stores, or allegations to that effect. This is not right in Australia in the year 2015. No worker should be exploited. That is why Labor supports this bill and will be moving several amendments in the other place which enhance and improve the bill and widen the scope of protection for workers.

Section 457 visas allow non-citizens to work in Australia where there are skills gaps in the labour market. My colleague the member for Corio rightly made the point that these types of visas must be strictly confined to the work they are meant to be doing and the workers must not be exploited and abused as a type of cheap labour. Labor therefore welcomes the government's moves to create further protection for workers. This bill implements a recommendation from the independent review into the integrity of the 457 program—primarily that it should be made unlawful for a sponsor to be paid by a visa applicant for a migration outcome and that this should be reinforced by a robust penalty and conviction framework.

It is particularly remarkable that we are debating this now. The 457 visa system has been around for over 20 years. The fact that we are only now debating a law that makes it unlawful for a sponsor to be paid by the visa applicant for a successful migration outcome shows that this system is still in dire need of reform if we are to continue this system with the full trust of the Australian people.

Under the current provisions, the government has no specific way to take legal action against such a payment for visa activity. This arises where a benefit is asked for or received in return for a migration outcome. Thankfully, this bill does provide that such an activity is unlawful regarding certain skilled work visa programs that have either a sponsorship or nomination element. And that is fair enough. The ostensible aim of the 457 visa system is to fill short-term skills shortages in a particular firm. It is not there as an entry path to permanent migration, and there should be no incentives in place where the temporary skilled migrant pays the employing sponsor for a particular outcome.

As I said previously, Labor welcomes the fact that the government is acting in this area, but we will be moving amendments in the Senate to improve this bill. Labor will propose that the provisions of this bill be applied to all work related visas, including working holiday and student visas, and not just be confined to 457 visas. It is difficult to argue that some classes of workers should be protected from exploitation and others not; yet this is what this bill does by demarcating between 457 visa holders and other forms of working visas. The 7-Eleven scandal shows that workers on all types of visas are affected by some scurrilous individuals and are worthy of protection by the provisions in this bill.

Labor will also move amendments to ensure that penalties cannot be applied to a visa holder who has been coerced by the sponsor into offering, making, asking or receiving a benefit. Workers should not be punished for being exploited, and it is important that amendments to that effect are supported. Labor will also move to increase penalties for sponsors who engage in this unconscionable conduct and also to put in place provisions which ensure that workers on student or working holiday visas are prevented from having an Australian business number to ensure that they cannot be employed as contracted or subcontractors. The final amendment relates to whistle-blower protection and for the Minister for Immigration and Border Protection to provide an annual report about these new provisions in the bill. So, as far as it goes, the bill is a step forward and it is important to support it, and Labor will proudly support it. But it does not go far enough, and we will be moving amendments to strengthen and broaden it and improve the oversight provision.

Like many other Labor speakers in this debate, I now want to move on to some general reflections on the 457 visa system. The 457 visa system has been the subject of a lot of debate—recently as a result of the China free trade agreement, but it is an issue that comes up regularly. If it is to continue, the Australian people need to have confidence in the system. They need to have confidence that it is working appropriately to fill short-term skills shortages and that it is being enforced properly—and that starts with politicians understanding how the system works.

My grave fear is that the China free trade agreement demonstrated that those opposite, the coalition government, do not understand the system. They do not understand how it works in practice. They do not understand the loopholes in the system and they do not understand the implications of the changes they made in the China free trade agreement. For example, labour market testing does not apply to Chinese 457 visa holders who come through the chapter 10 movement of natural persons. This is not in the industry facilitation agreements. Thankfully, Labor closed that loophole and now labour market testing must apply in that area. But, for chapter 10 movement, which is for all 457 visa holders who are approved individually in ASCO levels 1 through to 4—so the traditional 457 visa system—no labour market testing will be applied. That is of real concern.

Unfortunately, we could not touch it without affecting the trade agreement. The Minister for Trade and Investment got sold a dud. He got presented with a choice. The Chinese wanted freer movement of capital and the ability to purchase Australian agricultural property and other forms of land at the same level as our other trade agreements specified. He was not prepared to do that, because the National tail that wags the coalition government would not allow it. Instead, he sold out Australian workers by removing labour market testing, so that Australians are not required to be given first opportunity to win these jobs before an employer can then apply through the 457 visa system. Labor made some significant improvements in the agreement, and overall the agreement was worth signing and approving through parliament, but that is a loophole that unfortunately we could not fix entirely because of the way the agreement was negotiated by the minister for trade.

The broader 457 visa system is in need of deeper reform. At a recent Senate estimates hearing it was found that 20 per cent of the visas Fair Work Australia monitored in the 457 visa system were either not being employed against the position that they were applied for or were being paid incorrect salaries. Let me repeat that: of the 1,500 visas that Fair Work Australia inspected, 20 per cent were not compliant. If we extrapolate that to the number of 457 visa holders in this country—which is 105,000 primary 457 visa holders—that would apply to 20,000 visa holders not being paid the correct salary or not being employed against the position for which they have been brought into the country. That is incredibly problematic, because that points to exploitation on a mass scale. That they are being paid a lower salary than they should be or are being employed against a position that they should not be is not only bad for the migrants but it also undermines Australian wages and conditions. That is incredibly concerning and it reflects a system that is deeply in need of reform.

This is goes to why some employers use the 457 visa system. Recent studies have shown that a significant minority, about a third, of employers who use the 457 visa system do not use it to fill short-term skills gaps—which is ostensibly the purpose of this system. They use 457 visas because employees under these visas exhibit certain behavioural traits that they like, primarily due to their dependence on the sponsoring employer. So one-third of 457 visa employers surveyed identified limited mobility for the 457 visa workers and a perceived higher commitment to that firm as reasons for bringing in those workers. It is incredibly concerning that a third of employers under this system surveyed—and it may not be a representative sample, and I hope to God it is not—are not bringing in these workers to fill a skills gap; they are bringing them in because they are seen as more compliant. That is why more and more Australians have concerns and doubts about the 457 visa system.

That is problematic because we do need temporary skilled migration to this country. We need employers and companies to have the ability to fill short-term skills gaps, but to do that the Australian public need to be satisfied on a range of issues. Firstly, they need to be satisfied that there is a genuine skills shortage. Secondly, they need to be satisfied that the employer has long-term plans in place to do the training so that Australians can do the jobs. Thirdly, they need to be satisfied that Australians have had an opportunity to win that job—that there has been genuine labour market testing and a not a 'tick and flick' exercise, which, unfortunately, is what occurs all too often through this process. Fourthly, they need to be satisfied that migrants who come in under this system are paid the fair market wage. I think there is a strong argument to increase the tiers very significantly, if not across all industries then at an industry-by-industry level, so that it is a genuine market wage. Fifthly, the Australian people need to have confidence that there is adequate enforcement. As late as only a year ago, there were only 37 inspectors overseeing the 457 visa system. That has now increased to 300 but those 300 inspectors not only have to oversee the 457 visas but they also have to oversee the entire industrial relations system.

More reform is needed. I am going to be a champion within my party of that reform because we do need temporary skilled migration in this country, and I absolutely support that. I support genuine employers who do the right thing having access to the program, but we need to have the system watertight so that we do not see the abuse and exploitation we are seeing now that gives the system a bad name, that exploits migrants and undermines Australian wages and conditions. I commend this bill to the House. I think it urgently needs to the passed, but it needs to be passed with Labor's amendments.

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