David Hawker (Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I have received a letter from the honourable member for Watson proposing that a definite matter of public importance be submitted to the House for discussion, namely:

The government’s decision to provide migration visas for unskilled foreign apprentices.

I call upon those members who approve of the proposed discussion to rise in their places.

More than the number of members required by the standing orders having risen in their places—

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is amazing how quickly this government gets defensive when it is realised that it is failing one of its essential responsibilities. Labor has been accused of all sorts of things by government ministers for pursuing this. We even had Peter Hendy saying that the Labor Party was being racist in wanting to defend Australian jobs. To Peter Hendy I have two words of rebuttal: children overboard. We will not be lectured to by people who have been the architects of appealing to the worst elements in society; we simply want to do one thing and one thing only—defend opportunities for young Australians.

We want to make sure that young Australians do get the chance to undertake apprenticeships. We want to make sure that the industrial relations laws are not being used to bring in imported labour, which is being used to drive wages directly down. We do not want to see a continuation of the situation where the number of people being brought in under the skilled migration scheme matches the number of people who are turned away from TAFE—because, quite simply, defending Australian jobs is the government’s job. It is actually the government’s job to provide opportunities for its own citizens. Labor is going to continue to argue as we have that this visa category for apprenticeships should never have been established in the first place, that it is bad policy and that, as Kim Beazley made clear at this dispatch box on the Thursday night following the budget, it will be dispensed with under a Labor government. There will be no apprenticeship visas. The trade skills training visa will be gone and gone for good.

This scheme has nothing to do with skilled migration. The government keeps trying to cloak this as a skilled migration initiative. A new apprentice is not a skilled immigrant. A new apprentice is someone who has come here to take on a skill. And what happens to them at the end of their apprenticeship? Odds on that a very high number will decide to go back to the country from which they came. So at the end of these apprenticeships, after migrants have occupied them for three to five years, the skills crisis in Australia is no better off, because, instead of having somebody who would stay in Australia and occupy that spot in the Australian workforce, the apprenticeship has been taken. And there are always a limited number of apprenticeships available.

The Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs wants to liken this to providing extra opportunities for overseas students to study at university. It is completely different. When you add on extra university places for overseas students, you do not have a finite number, but for every apprentice you do not just need a position at TAFE; you also need to create a job. There are a finite number of employers in a position to take on apprentices. So Labor has argued, and we will continue to argue, that if a position is available in Ballarat it ought to be advertised in Ballarat. And, if you cannot fill it in Ballarat, you do not go straight offshore. If you cannot fill it in Ballarat, you advertise it in Bendigo, in Brisbane and around the country to provide opportunities for people in Australia before you hand it over to Beijing, Beirut, Bombay, Bristol, Birmingham, Belfast or anywhere else in the world—for no reason other than it is the government’s job to provide opportunities for young Australians. It is a simple job for the government to provide opportunities for young Australians.

The government might want to walk away from that; the government might want to attempt all sorts of sleight of hand and pretend it is the same as bringing in overseas students—it is not. Only a limited number of apprenticeships will ever be available in Australia and you have an endless stream of young Australians wanting those opportunities. Yet the government says, ‘Oh, but this is all about skilled migration; this is all about a solution to the crisis in qualified workers.’ It does nothing to fix the skills crisis, because at the end, if a young Australian filled that apprenticeship, odds on they would stay in the country and at that point you would have a qualified tradesperson to help Australian industry, particularly in regional areas. But, instead of going down that path, the government goes down the alternative path and says, ‘We’ll just bring people in from overseas.’ At the end of it the skills crisis is no better off. It is not about skilled migration—it is not about responding to the skills crisis—it is about taking opportunities away from young Australians.

There is no example more shameful than the fact that you do not even have to advertise a position locally. The Treasurer and Acting Prime Minister has tried to defend the visa on the basis that the regional certifying bodies are established and certified by state governments. What he neglects to mention—and he has had a few goes at it over the last two days in question time—is that the criteria which the states have to make an assessment under are set by the Commonwealth. So, sure, the bodies that give the rubber stamp at the end are accredited by the states, but the criteria they have to apply is completely set by the Commonwealth. It is defined by the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs.

The department of immigration seems confused enough itself as to what the criteria are. It listed four yesterday: the migration occupations in demand list, whether or not there is a state or territory shortage list, whether the vacancy had been advertised on a website, and whether or not there had been a local shortage in that region. But then, asked if one would have to satisfy all four, the department of immigration did not know. The department does not know whether you have to satisfy all four or maybe one, or maybe it is just the vibe that you have to apply across that set of criteria. But the criteria are set by the Commonwealth. The Commonwealth could very easily say, ‘One criterion will be: you have to advertise the position locally and, if you cannot fill it locally, you have to advertise it in neighbouring regions.’ It is completely open to the Commonwealth to make that one of the criteria. That is all that the Commonwealth would have to do, and then the state registered bodies would immediately have the authority to apply the new criteria.

But the Commonwealth government do not do that, and they do not do it for one very simple reason: they do not want the opportunities to be taken by young Australians because they do not want people to be paid the going rate; they want people to be paid the lowest possible rate available under the new industrial relations scheme. That is where the exploitation of workers who come here on work visas does not just affect those workers; it affects the new going rate for all Australian workers because that sets the new lower benchmark. All they would have to do is change the criteria.

So, when the parliamentary secretary speaks after me in this debate, instead of giving the run that he normally gives of, ‘This is all because Labor’s connected with the unions and therefore its motivation is intrinsically evil,’ and instead of running the argument that we know we are going to hear, ‘Oh, but these are state rubber-stamp bodies and therefore it is all their fault,’ he should answer one simple question: why won’t the government insist in its criteria that you have to advertise the job in Australia?

It is a very simple question. From the day this visa was put into regulations, Labor went out and said that you should have to advertise the position locally and that, if you cannot fill it locally, you should have to advertise the position in neighbouring regions. Not once has the government had the guts to stand up and defend what the circumstances would be in which it would be fair to not advertise a position locally. They will not defend it, and yet they will not change it either. They will not change it for the simple reason that, if it is driving wages down, it is doing the job they asked it to do. If it is denying opportunities to young Australians, then it is doing the job they wanted it to do.

If the government does not want the apprenticeship visa to drive wages down, if it does not want young Australians to miss out on TAFE opportunities and apprenticeship opportunities because of this visa, then it should change the criteria. The government should not blame state registered bodies for not applying criteria that do not exist. If the government wants them to apply the criteria, the government should put them in the regulations. That is all the government has to do, and it will not.

We can see exactly how effectively this visa works to drive wages down. The Treasurer has stood up a couple of times in the last couple of days wanting to defend it, and he has claimed that any apprentice who is seeking a visa to undertake training in Australia could only get one if a regional certifying body certified that no suitable Australian was available. That is not one of the criteria. That you even have to advertise and check whether an Australian is available is not on the form. Nowhere on the form is there an instruction to the regional certifying bodies.

If the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs wants to fudge it, he has to live with the fact that before estimates hearings yesterday the representatives from the department of immigration thought that there were four criteria. They did not know whether you had to apply one of them or whether you had to apply all four, but they did know that advertising the position locally was not on the list. They did know that advertising the position locally had nothing to do with whether or not you would get the rubber stamp and have the opportunity to bring someone in under this visa.

It is no small argument at the time of a skills crisis that we want to make sure that at the end of every apprenticeship we have a qualified worker in Australia. At the beginning of every apprenticeship we want to make sure that we have given the best possible opportunities to young Australians. Labor is going to continue to argue for providing the best possible opportunities for young Australians because it is the right thing to do. It is what an Australian government is meant to do—not provide the lowest possible wages to industry but provide the best possible opportunities for Australians.

The government’s approach is fundamentally different to ours. This difference forms one of the key divides between that side of the House and this side of the House. We will defend opportunities for young Australians. We will oppose legislation which drives wages down. We want to make sure that every apprenticeship is advertised locally. We are not going to allow the government to get away with saying that, because the rubber stamp is given by state authorities, therefore they set the criteria. The criteria are set by the ministers who sit opposite. The criteria are set by the people who sit in the cabinet room, of whom the parliamentary secretary is not yet one. Ministers who have sat around the cabinet room have refused to do the decent thing that Australians believe they ought to do. Australians believe that you ought to advertise a position locally. Australians believe that the government ought to make every effort to provide apprenticeship opportunities for young Australians.

I invite the parliamentary secretary, as he gets up here, not to dodge it—to be fair dinkum and explain. When is it fair not to advertise the position locally? If the government cannot do that, why will it not insist that advertising the position locally be part of a set of criteria that the regional certifying bodies apply? The parliamentary secretary knows full well that it is not on the form, that it is not in their instructions, that it was not on the list of four that went to estimates yesterday. As one of the people charged to defend the new industrial relations laws, he knows what driving wages down is all about.

Driving wages down is something Labor will not support. Denying opportunities to young Australians is something Labor will never do. This apprenticeship visa came about as an idea from one company and one company alone. In order to curry favour initially with one business in Australia, we now have thousands of young Australians wanting to get into an apprenticeship but missing out on that opportunity.

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The bottom line in all this, despite all the huff and puff we have heard on the other side—for the third time, I might add—is that the introduction of the trade skills training visa is demonstrably good for young Australians.

Opposition Members:

Opposition members interjecting—

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If you had listened the last two or three times we had this discussion, you might have some sense of it.

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Order! The parliamentary secretary will address the chair.

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

It is not a matter of neglect, as has been brazenly asserted by opponents who would rather play politics than do the hard yards on policy. We are still not seeing policy from the opposition. This is just politics, plain and simple. And it is very base politics. Xenophobia is being used as a crass attempt to appeal to a base that they betrayed long ago.

Australia does face a skills challenge. It is estimated that within five years there will be 200,000 more jobs than people to fill them. That is with our current very high levels of skilled immigration. Have we heard any recognition of this on the other side in any of the policy pronouncements—not just in the area of immigration but in so many other areas of policy? Not one word. They are just playing politics. They are not addressing the challenges that face this country. That is what we on this side of the House are charged to do, and that is what we are seeking to do. 

There are two causes for this skills challenge. One has been the prolonged period of strong economic growth, which has reduced unemployment to 30-year lows. Youth unemployment has dropped by nearly 40 per cent over the last 10 years. Prolonged economic growth has put pressure on the availability of skilled workers. We plead guilty to the problem of long-term, high economic growth, which has led to pressure on the availability of skilled workers.

The second contributing factor to a skills shortage is the ageing of the population. Of all of the challenges that this country faces, the biggest challenge by a country mile is the issue of an ageing population. In fact, the OECD has estimated that by 2025 there will be some 70 million people going into the retirement age cohort across the whole of the OECD. In the same period, in the next 19 years, there will be a net increase of five million people across the whole of the OECD going into the working age cohort. It is a very serious imbalance, which is already starting to impinge but is going to keep going and going because of the reality of that baby boomer group moving through our population.

This is a really serious challenge. Again, it is an issue we have not heard addressed in any way on the other side of the House. It requires a multifaceted approach. We have not heard this issue addressed. It is a very serious issue and it invites a wide-ranging response. There is no silver bullet. This is the third time we have had this debate, but there has been no new information—not one word of new information—from those opposite. They are just playing politics with this. There is no silver bullet. We have got the shadow Treasurer here. Have we heard his policies to address this problem? Not a word.

The training visa is a further important initiative as part of a wide-ranging response to this emerging skills shortage. It represents action on multiple fronts. That is what this government is all about. In trying to deal with this ageing population issue, we are working on multiple fronts: workplace relations reform, which is a very critical part of that, introducing some flexibility into our workforce and getting a culture of flexibility across this nation to deal with globalisation and the ageing population problems; welfare to work reforms to try to encourage people who can work part time back into the workforce; the independent contractor legislation to try to assist older Australians to come back into the workforce in an easy way; superannuation reforms to encourage older Australians to stay longer in the workforce; tax reforms to encourage older Australians to stay longer in the workforce; a huge investment in skills training and new apprenticeships; and, of course, the immigration program, which is playing an important part.

The regional apprenticeship training visa is all about this. It is part of a much wider government policy program across many portfolios to address Australia’s skills shortage. The training visa is but one part, but it is an important part. It is one of many policy responses. The training visa contributes importantly to young Australians in a number of ways. It enables regional Australia to share in the economic growth enjoyed by city based Australians. Filling skills shortages in regional areas—

Julia Irwin (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mrs Irwin interjecting

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Fowler!

Julia Irwin (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mrs Irwin interjecting

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Fowler is warned!

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

maintains industry and business activity in regional Australia. In turn, this protects and further builds new opportunities for young Australians, as well as enhancing the quality of life of all in regional Australia. There is no more pressing issue I hear as I move around the country than employers in regional areas saying to me, ‘We need to make sure that we have the skill base in regional Australia—

Julia Irwin (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mrs Irwin interjecting

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Fowler will remove herself from the chamber under standing order 94(a).

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

to maintain performance in regional Australia, maintain job growth in regional Australia and to build prosperity in regional Australia.’

Julia Irwin (Fowler, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mrs Irwin interjecting

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Fowler will be named in a moment if she is not careful!

The member for Fowler then left the chamber.

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

If they only listened instead of yelling at people they might learn something. The second reason this training visa contributes importantly to young Australians is that it protects training opportunities for young Australians in regional Australia.

Jennie George (Throsby, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Environment and Heritage) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

That is rubbish!

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

‘Rubbish’ you might say, but just think about it for a minute instead of putting your union cap on and just knee-jerking.

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Throsby will have some time to speak in a moment. If she is not careful, she will not get that opportunity.

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

At the moment many apprenticeship courses are under threat in regional Australia because of a lack of critical mass.

Jennie George (Throsby, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Environment and Heritage) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Ms George interjecting

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Perhaps you might go out and have a talk to some of these authorities out there. The involvement of full-fee-paying apprentices from overseas will help maintain numbers in apprenticeship courses and will help maintain a critical mass. Full-fee-paying students will provide an important source of funding and boost the viability of courses. This helps young Australians. It keeps training opportunities open and available in their region. Labor has no feel for or empathy with regional Australia. It is coming through again and again.

The third and important reason why this training visa contributes to young Australians is that none of this is at the expense of local students getting their opportunities. The training visa will only be available where businesses have not been able to attract Australians to apprenticeship positions. This is strictly controlled, as the opposition have been advised on many occasions, by regional certification bodies. These regional certification bodies have to be nominated and endorsed by the state and territory Labor governments. Every one of them has to nominate and endorse these certifying bodies. These agencies are required and are very well placed to judge that no Australian apprentice can be found to fill the vacancy before allowing entry of any overseas apprentice. The overriding criterion is that they have to be satisfied that the apprenticeship cannot be filled locally. They are well placed to use all sorts of techniques to do this, including, if they choose, to confer with local unions if required. Bear in mind that these are all authorities approved by Labor governments.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Mr Burke interjecting

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You may well laugh, but your colleagues in state Labor governments approve and endorse these authorities. Many of these authorities are in fact direct agencies of these state Labor governments. Their requirement is that they must be satisfied that the apprenticeship cannot be filled locally. If they chose to do so—as I would expect that they would if they are appointed by state Labor governments—they can confer with local unions if they feel they need to satisfy themselves about the vacancy that exists. The shadow minister knows full well that this is the case. There is very strong protection.

The training visa builds on 10 years of initiatives which have seen a 146 per cent increase in new apprenticeships since 1996, from 130,000 to 390,000. You on the other side should be deeply embarrassed by that. New apprenticeships have gone from 130,000 to 390,000 and you have the gall to stand here and pretend that you have something innovative.

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Goldstein will refrain from using the word ‘you’.

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

My apologies, Mr Deputy Speaker. This government has not let down young Australians. On the contrary, the Howard government’s performance has restored a sense of hope and opportunity to the young people of Australia, as witnessed at the ballot box at the last election. There was a strong move by young Australians to vote for the Howard government. Why? Because we have restored a sense of hope. Youth unemployment has dropped by nearly 40 per cent, from 15.1 per cent to 10.9 per cent, at a time when real wages have gone up by nearly 17 per cent. That is performance over a protracted period of time. There has been a 122 per cent increase in the number of young people under the age of 19 commencing new apprenticeships since 1996, and they now account for 41 per cent of all apprenticeship starts.

This government has not let down young Australians. On the contrary, we have restored a sense of hope and opportunity. The number of school students getting a head start in the VET program has increased by 253 per cent since 1996, so approximately half of all senior secondary school students are now getting a head start in life. The government is providing funds to the states and territories to support an additional 167,000 vocational education and training places by 2008. We have 24 technical colleges in the pipeline. These are all substantive initiatives. This is a record we can be proud of, and it is one that we have to build on.

This government has not let down young Australians. In the recent budget we added to all this an additional $106 million over four years for new apprenticeship centres, $10 million for the Australian Lifesaver Training Academy to provide high-quality training and education programs, and a raft of other measures. We are not going to rest on our laurels when it comes to ensuring that there are skilled job opportunities for young Australians. We must confront the challenge I mentioned earlier of an ageing population, a challenge which dictates that we must do all that is possible on a whole range of fronts.

So why are Labor banging on about this? What is their motive? Against all that background—against that urgent need—even when these apprenticeship visas reach full penetration, in terms of young people coming from overseas to be trained, we are looking at an estimated 3½ thousand visa holders in any one year. There are 390,000 apprentices now, with many more opportunities being created, and we are talking about 3½ thousand coming in. Doesn’t it make you wonder about the context in which these arguments are being put? This is just a grubby attempt to lie and scaremonger—

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Goldstein will withdraw the word ‘lie’.

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I withdraw the word ‘lie’. It is a grubby attempt to scare people in the electorate in a desperate attempt to restore some voting strength to their original base—a base they betrayed many years ago. What we are seeing is a stunt, plain and simple—an exercise in promoting xenophobia. We are seeing an explicit strategy by the Labor Party to promote xenophobia—to create misplaced fear and misinformation—as a means of appealing to a voter base they betrayed long ago. We know that is the case; we are hearing it out of the ACTU. We will see this all the way through to the election.

Mr Tony Burke (Watson, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

We’ll guarantee that.

Andrew Robb (Goldstein, Liberal Party, Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

‘We’ll guarantee that’—some xenophobia from the other side of the House. I will make some predictions myself. (Time expired)

Jennie George (Throsby, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Environment and Heritage) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I am very pleased to participate in this MPI debate, because it is very important. The Labor Party has argued from the beginning that the trade skills training visa is just another quick-fix solution to a problem this government has known about for the decade it has been in government. The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs talked about the major economic challenges facing our nation—and no-one denies that those challenges are real and obvious to us all. But no-one can deny the simple fact that, having known about these issues, particularly the issue of the emerging skills crisis in our nation, we have not heard any coherent strategy from the Howard government about how one addresses these endemic problems.

All the reputable authorities in Australia are telling us that the skills crisis in our nation is one of the largest brakes on our future prosperity and our potential economic growth. The government does nothing about any coherent strategy to address the skills problem but resorts to bringing skilled migrants to Australia—and now there is the proposal to have unskilled apprentices brought from overseas to be trained in Australia. Because Labor oppose that and say it is short-sighted and the wrong policy, we are somehow just putting on a political stunt—I think the parliamentary secretary used those words—and, worse still, we are being accused of being xenophobic.

I think the government is very defensive about this training visa because the community appreciates that it is the wrong way to go. Why is it the wrong way to go? Because today we have 193,000 young Australians aged 15 to 19 who are not in work and who are not in training, who would be desperately happy to have the opportunity of an apprenticeship in this country. It is all right for the Treasurer in his defensive mode to flick-pass to the regional certifying bodies, but it is not the regional bodies that are responsible; it is the federal government that has allowed this visa to be introduced as another quick fix to an endemic problem.

At least the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs now recognises that we have a crisis in skills in this country. Where has this government been for the last 10 years, when the alarm bells were ringing? All we have seen, time after time, are quick-fix, short-term solutions. I could not believe it when I heard the parliamentary secretary say that as he travelled around Australia, particularly regional Australia, he was told that one of the problems was that we did not have a critical mass of people who wanted to take up apprenticeships. In the time that the government has brought in 270,000 skilled migrants—and we are all for migration; skilled migrants have helped build a prosperous nation over the years—we have turned away 300,000 young Australians from TAFE courses.

You do not have to tell me about needing a critical mass. Come to my region in the Illawarra, where I have an unemployment rate among young people of over 35 per cent. In the last two years, in a coalition with business, the unions and the group training providers, we have put 200 and more young people, many of them unemployed, into apprenticeships. And when we go around to try and extract money from this government, it is like drawing blood out of a stone. For a meagre contribution of $100,000 a year, you have to traipse the corridors and knock on doors to say to the government: ‘We’ve got a local solution that works. It’s a solution that addresses very high rates of youth unemployment combined with the skills crisis, which is a problem not just in our region but across the whole of Australia.’

How dare the parliamentary secretary say that those who oppose this visa have no regard or empathy for the plight of regional Australia? We live in regional Australia. We know what the problems are. Let me just tell you about other regions, not just my own. In the Illawarra there is 35 per cent youth unemployment; Richmond-Tweed, 37 per cent; Gippsland, 28 per cent; Tasmania, 25 per cent; and the Loddon Mallee region, 32 per cent. I think government members should be hanging their heads in shame, because you are saying to all those young people, wherever they are located, that this government has given up hope. It has no vision for them. The only response it has is a quick-fix, short-term political fix, bringing skilled people from overseas, which is necessary but not the solution to the endemic problem.

It is not as if Australia is short of workers. There would be many workers already out there at work who would be more than happy to be upskilled, and I can assure you that there are many thousands of young people across Australia currently being denied the opportunity of training in an apprenticeship who would jump at the chance. But this government has been asleep at the wheel for 10 long years. We have known that this crisis was upon our doorstep, and all we have done is resort to the solution of bringing people from overseas to fill the gaps.

That is not good enough at a time when Australia has to compete in a global economy. Why is it that Australia, among all the developed nations, has reduced its public investment in TAFEs and the universities? When our competitors are putting more and more public funds into their people, investing in their youth, investing in skills, investing in human capital, we are doing the absolute reverse and saying, ‘We’ve got no solution. We’ll wipe our hands and allow employers to bring in young people from overseas to take up apprenticeship opportunities in this country.’ I think that is an unconscionable way to proceed.

It is unconscionable, because there are low-cost alternatives, as our region has shown. I invite the parliamentary secretary to come down and see what we have been able to do with very little support from this federal government. There are alternatives, and Labor has talked about a lot of those alternatives. Why don’t you look at our trade completion bonus, so that we can do something about the problem of 40 per cent of young apprentices dropping out before they finish their studies?

On top of that, when the budget had all this surplus money to invest in the skilling of our people, what did we find? The one thing that I have relied on locally to convince our employers to take on an unemployed young person in an apprenticeship was a program that was only worth $13.7 million, an incentive program to encourage local business in regional and rural Australia to take on young people. What happened to that program? That program was axed. And what happened to funding for vocational education? We have a smaller percentage being spent on vocational education than ever before.

This government has no coherent strategy to address a problem that it has known about for a long time. It is not as if this has suddenly descended upon us. Alarm bells have been ringing. The AiG, a reputable employer organisation, has said that by 2010 we will need 100,000 additional trained tradespeople.

Another quick-fix solution was the panacea of the Australian technical colleges—the 25 that we were promised as the solution to apprenticeship training. At last count, I think four of them were up and running. One of them, in Gladstone, has one apprentice. At best they have 100. In the meantime, through a low-cost program, 200 young people in the Illawarra have had a chance to get an apprenticeship. So there are solutions to the problem, if only the government wanted to listen to and learn from some of the creative and innovative suggestions that have been made across the nation.

A quick fix is no fix, and this visa is yet another quick fix to a problem that should have been addressed a long time ago and that is still crying out to be addressed. The Australian people are rightly demanding of this government that its first obligation is to create opportunities for our youth, to create opportunities for our workers to be upskilled, to train Australians first and train them now. The government has the means to do it. Put the money in and make the investment, because there is no better investment than investing in the future of young people across this nation.

John Forrest (Mallee, National Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

These matters of public importance debates are always interesting discussions. I enjoy participating. But I do enjoy the opportunity to defend the need for trades skills training visas. The opposition members who have spoken do not spend any time in the part of the world that I live in. I know that my constituents enthusiastically support this initiative, albeit with safeguards relating to some of the concerns that opposition members have been expressing. It is a significant issue in north-west Victoria.

Listening to the discussion and the comments from members of the opposition, it staggers me that they seem to overlook the fact that this nation is enjoying a huge boost to its economy—it is just gigantic. I wonder what discussion would have occurred in the Commonwealth parliament in the post world war development of Australia, with an argument that said that this nation did not need to encourage the migration of skilled people to ensure that the growing economy could continue to grow.

What I know is that the labour shortage in my constituency is holding back investment. It is holding back investors. The question they need to know the answer to when they are investing in labour intensive industries is: what is the assurance that there will be the necessary labour? When you think about the huge amount of development that is occurring along the Murray Valley, with phenomenal development in horticulture, those investors are asking those questions.

I have been quite vociferous in my representation on this matter from the time I arrived in this parliament. I did not get much response from the then Labor government, but I am certainly enjoying the response that I am receiving from this government in addressing this issue. It is more than just about harvest labour. Yes, there is a very real demand for unskilled people, but there is a huge demand for semiskilled people, the people who we need to ensure that the growth of our abattoir industries continue, abattoirs involved not just in livestock but in avian—ducks and squabs; and the tertiary industries associated with the very productive primary industries around the region, people who produce plastic tanks and fibreglass manufacturing. Then there are the trades related skills needed, not just in the normal building skills but in irrigation development; motor mechanics; horticulture, which is becoming more and more scientifically based; and even nursery people.

Then there is the technical and professional demand. Talk to some of my municipalities, my local government people, about the struggles they have just to get an engineer. Buloke Shire, in my constituency, still does not have an engineer. Why would an engineer be interested when there is a boom economy and he could obtain far more financially beneficial employment in the big, booming mining industries that are occurring around the nation?

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs, the member for Goldstein, gave an overall picture of the future. I see it as doing two things, including addressing the issues that opposition members have raised about meeting the needs of young Australians. The reality is that we have been doing that. All of the skilled areas in my part of the world are listed and are well known. That is the reason why a huge amount of investment has been made into a TAFE facility at Swan Hill. There is a state-of-the-art diesel mechanic training facility, which I am immensely proud of. I commend the state government on its huge investment there. It staggers me that it seems to have escaped the opposition that this nation is enjoying good growth and that, if we are to ensure that that continues, we need to ensure that the skills of the people who do those skilled tasks are enhanced.

I have a machinery dealer in my constituency. He has not yet made an application for this program. He is certainly interested in it. I have encouraged him. He has been seeking diesel mechanics for some time now. He has advertised and done all the right things to try to attract locals. They are just not there. They would rather go off and live in a big metropolis. Unfortunately, some of them are too used to enjoying taxpayer support if they want to live in a provincial centre and are not interested in coming out to north-west Victoria. There is a huge need and demand. I am pleased to hear some of that being acknowledged.

So we end up in this position: discussing the need for trades skills training visas. I am quite satisfied that adequate safeguards are in place to ensure that no Australian who wants to engage in a particular trade is cheated of that opportunity. I have been quite supportive of the state government initiatives that have occurred. State governments have recognised this issue, particularly in Victoria. They have a number of regional offices. I have worked with those, most particularly on the issue of business migration, which requires state agency approval for an international investor who wants to make an investment. There are certain rules and criteria under which they can do that. That is occurring with good supervision. I am quite confident that those agencies will continue with that level of supervision to ensure that the concerns being raised here today by the opposition are addressed.

It is quite clear that, before an apprenticeship can fill a vacancy, the regional certifying body has to ensure that no Australian apprentice can be found to fill that vacancy. I think the reality—and the point that seems to have been missed by opposition speakers in this discussion—is that all of the listed shortages are already gazetted. We know that we have a huge shortage of diesel mechanics. We know that we have a huge shortage of horticultural and nursery people. We know all about all of these; they are already listed. We know we have a shortage of people with expertise in operating comprehensive and quite scientific irrigation systems. All of those are already listed. That has come out of years of frustration with this approach of trying to attract those young people, which opposition members have addressed today.

I can see a parallel approach to this issue when I look at the investments in training in my own constituency. But I am looking to the future. I want to see some of the huge investment that has already occurred along the Murray Valley continue. I want to see the employment that the planting of 3,000 hectares of almonds or olive trees brings to the region. The struggling community of Boort is not in my constituency but on the south-west corner of it. A huge investment has occurred there in the development of olives. It has revived that town. It has revived the school, it has revived the community and it has given it a strong sense of hope. The most important thing of all is that it is providing opportunity for young people who reside in that community. It is less tempting for them to move off to the metropolis or to the strong provincial centres of Ballarat and Bendigo.

I stand here and enthusiastically support the new training skills visa. It is a further demonstration that the government has responded to my very strong representations over the years on this and related matters of resources for labour. It demonstrates the government’s commitment to addressing trade skills and labour needs not just in my own constituency but right across rural Australia. This new visa is good for regional Australia. I often say that, if it is good for regional Australia, I will support it. It will have broader future economic benefits, and I stand here to support it enthusiastically. I am still staggered by the attitude of the opposition. I would invite them to come out and speak with my horticultural industry bodies and with the tertiary industries associated with Sunraysia, Mildura, Swan Hill and Horsham, down in the Wimmera. They are strong, vibrant, growing provincial centres. The strongest representation I receive all the time is on this need for skilled labour. I am quite confident that the arrangements that are in place will ensure that young Australians continue to get opportunities. I am confident it will provide additional resources to ensure that strong growth continues, and I am looking forward to its full implementation.

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

As the immigration minister in the Queensland government, I advocated at the ministerial conference that we move to 350,000 migrants a year. That was a position on which I got full agreement from the Queensland Bjelke-Petersen cabinet, and I had a dreadful fight with Senator Robert Ray at the time.

There is one hell of a difference between the situation now and the situation then. We had an award system. Bringing in those people was not going to crush the incomes of Australians. Now we have no award system and the bringing of those people into Australia on an unlimited basis will crush the award system and the standard of living of the employee class—the workers, if you like—in this country.

It is very interesting if you shut up and listen. The member for Goldstein is a classic example of a person who I do not think has ever in his life listened to anyone except rich and powerful people. I know him well. I know him from the NFF. When he was director of the NFF it was always referred to as ‘no family farms’. I went to a meeting where the then head of the NFF actually said that. He said, ‘We’re inefficient at the present moment, but as corporate farming takes over we will become efficient.’ Crush out the owner-operator farmers in Australia! That was the culture that presided whilst he was there, whilst he did untold damage to that organisation then. He is now doing untold damage to the coalition.

People on this side: do not knock him. He is your greatest asset! He is hurling at you that you are xenophobic. On my score, two elections were won by the coalition on that issue. Two elections were run on that issue. This fellow is accusing you of it. You might be hot contenders for the next election. I do not know. All I know is that, if that culture and the philosophy that he espouses continue on the side of the coalition, exactly the same damage will be done to them as was done to the NFF whilst that man had a dominant role in that operation.

I sat on an aeroplane with a gentleman who represented a company that did maintenance work on particular machinery. I will not betray his confidence. They employed about 20 or 30 people in Australia. I asked, ‘How do you get people to go out to these isolated mining situations?’ He said, ‘It was very difficult until you blokes liberalised the immigration laws.’ He said: ‘Now, of course, it is very easy. Half of our employees’—that is, 15 people—‘are now Indonesians.’ He said jokingly to me: ‘You don’t have to worry too much about them. They do not put much pressure on you about conditions and those sorts of things.’ No. They are prepared to work for nothing! What about the Philippines rural wage?

The member for Goldstein got up and talked about regional Australia. He would not know about it. He has never set foot in it. I have never seen or heard of him going into a regional area in the country in my life. He possibly has. I do not know. I am certain that he does not speak to the people I speak to when I go into regional Australia. There is a precedent for bringing in those people. In South Africa there was Cecil Rhodes. People are proud of having had a Rhodes scholarship. I would be ashamed to have my name remotely associated with that gentleman.

Russell Broadbent (McMillan, Liberal Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Don’t worry!

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

You say, ‘Don’t worry.’ I am quite proud not to have been in that category at any stage of my life. I am immensely proud, as a matter of fact. On my reading of history, half the Matabele nation was wiped out. On my reading of history, nearly a million people died in the Boer War, including one of my distant relatives. Why? To make Cecil Rhodes rich. When he got control of the South African government, which he had created, he brought in workers who worked for nothing at all. Why? To make him rich. The people who populated South Africa woke up one morning and it was no longer their country. They had very badly treated the other Africans, and it was fairly predictable that they would get a bit of their own back when the other mob took over.

The important point of this is: people work there for nothing. The wage in the Phillipines for agricultural work—as this man from regional Australia would know—is $2.70 a day; ours is about $15 an hour. It is pretty poor pay for the work that they do, but it is good compared with what they get in Indonesia. So this company, quite predictably, is bringing workers in from Indonesia. What that is going to do to the wages and conditions in this country scares the hell out of me.

There are new members in this place—and the member for Watson is one of them—but there are older members too who have a lot to answer for on the issue of the TAFEs. When I was elected to this parliament, the first two functions that I went to were TAFE—I do not know what they called them—graduation ceremonies. There were nearly 1,000 people at the one at Innisfail, and nearly 1,000 people at the one at Mount Isa. They had 30 or 40 employees in both those TAFEs. Innisfail TAFE is now trying to sell off and get rid of two-thirds of the building. It is empty. It would be flat out having a dozen people in it now. As for having a graduation ceremony: there is no-one there to graduate. There are hardly any people graduating or going through them at all. I cannot speak for all of Australia; I can only speak for the area I represent. But if I were associated with the government, and started talking about TAFEs, I would hang my head in shame. There are none; they have simply ceased to exist in areas that I represent.

If you are short of labourers out in the bush or any other part of Australia, there is one sure way to get them—ever since the Phoenicians invented money there has been one sure way to get more workers—and that is to increase wages. When I was a young man, thanks to the enlightened governments of the day—of John McEwen and Joh Bjelke-Petersen—we had huge mining booms and beef roads being built, and we were paid colossal money. As an unskilled labourer, within two or three months I had saved enough money to go out and pay cash for a brand new small car—in today’s money, nearly $20,000. I played up a bit, Mr Deputy Speaker, so I was not saving all of it.

There is another way to supply those workers—to bring people in from countries where people are used to working for absolutely nothing, under no conditions whatsoever. That is the other method of doing it. There is no doubt which pathway the member for Goldstein wishes to take us down.

I would like him to do a little bit of reading. I have represented mining areas. My family have come from mining areas in this country since the 1870s; we have lived on the goldfields and the copper fields of Australia. I know that, in those days, before the immigration was tightened up, one in 32 people who went down the mines never came back up again—or came back up again and died a wicked death from miner’s phthisis. That is what happened in those days, until the immigration laws were pulled up by the incoming government in 1901. In that year, the new federal government was created, and the first member for Kennedy in this place spoke about exactly the same issue that I am speaking about today, 105 years later.

Let me just go back to the NFF for one moment. This fellow presided over the NFF. Have a look at his success story.

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Kennedy will refer to members by their titles.

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

I was referring to the member for Goldstein. Half of Australia’s wool industry has vanished. Fifty per cent of our sheep are gone. The Special Minister of State, who is at the table, is shaking his head. Go and have a fight with Alan Jones, because it was from Alan Jones’s program that I was quite staggered to find out that we had nearly 200 million sheep in Australia and now we have around 100 million. And you represent a sheep area, so you should be ashamed not to know that.

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The member for Kennedy will refer to members by their seats.

Bob Katter (Kennedy, Independent) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

In the cattle industry, the numbers are down 20 per cent. Our dairy industry is down nearly 15 per cent. Our sugar industry is down 10 per cent. I do not know anything about wheat so I will have to leave that out.

He was a wonderful success story, wasn’t he! Half of Australian agriculture has vanished without trace under the leadership and the policies of the likes of the member for Goldstein. The Special Minister of State shakes his head. Come back here and give me the figures and show me where I am wrong. Do not come here and shake your head and disagree when your ignorance is so towering that you do not know what the figures are. Go and have a fight with Alan Jones.

Mining prices have not doubled. I quoted in this place that they had doubled. And I was very surprised to find out, from a very senior person, that they had more than doubled but the money has not come back to Australians. (Time expired)

Ian Causley (Page, Deputy-Speaker) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

The discussion is concluded.