Kelvin Thomson (Wills, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Link to this | Hansard source

Last week we saw unemployment rise to over 800,000. This is simply not good enough. Our unemployment is too high, our youth unemployment is too high, our long-term unemployment is too high and our underemployment is too high. We have neglected the unemployed and we have neglected the younger generation in particular. The situation has deteriorated markedly under this government. They show no interest in a manufacturing industry for Australia. Their 2014 budget of massive cuts was a replica of the austerity measures which have proved disastrous in Europe, and it eroded confidence.

This situation has been building up for years now. It is not only this government that is to blame. I am unimpressed by the media reporting of unemployment. In the first place, there is nowhere near enough of it. We seem to want to talk about anything but unemployment. There is way too little discussion of the things we need to tackle in order to unite us as a nation—such as unemployment. And, indeed, much of the reporting of the latest unemployment figures was smug, ivory tower economists' spin that things are not all that bad. It is just nonsense.

Unemployment is a recipe for social problems such as crime, drugs, mental health issues and homelessness. There is no way that we will successfully tackle these things against a background of 800,000 people out of work. We need to face up to the fact that unemployment in Australia is a real problem and talk more about it. We should stop being so smug about the agenda we have pursued for the past 30 years. We have been undergoing an experiment, and we have not been alone. Quite a few other countries have travelled the same path of free market liberalism. Its hallmarks have been globalisation, privatisation, deregulation, free movement of goods and free movement of people. Its advocates said that it would strengthen the Australian economy and make us more resilient to external shocks. But, far from making our economy more diverse and more resilient, we have become narrow and vulnerable. The advocates of globalisation and free trade knew perfectly well that this would kill off many of our existing manufacturing industries, but they claimed that competition would bring new industries—knowledge-intensive industries—to take their place. They were wrong. Instead of getting a more diverse economy we have become increasingly dependent on bulk exports. We are a specialist raw commodity exporter highly vulnerable to the ups and downs of commodity markets. For a time the mining boom obscured the pitfalls of this strategy. But with 800,000 people out of work the free market economists and business lobbyists have no clue about how to change this. They refuse to admit that their strategy has failed. They are unrepentant. Having dug us into this hole, they want us to keep digging.

It is going on in both the public sector and the private sector. In the public sector we have Australia Post. Australia Post's use of labour hire companies to contract out mail delivery has been disgraceful. Australia Post was expressly warned in 2012 and 2013 that labour hire companies were using cheap, unregulated labour that did not comply with minimum wages. They arrogantly dismissed these warnings, claiming in 2013 that their contractual relationships with contractors 'ensure they comply with the law and provide appropriate working terms and conditions for people they employ'. They were warned again in 2014. In December 2014, Joan Doyle from the Communication Workers Union wrote to an Australia Post regional manager in Dandenong South that Mr Baljit Singh had disclosed that he used six contractors to provide staff to perform his contracts with Australia Post in relation to Oz Trade and Services Pty Ltd. Joan Doyle pointed out that in November 2014 Australia Post had maintained that they were satisfied that there had been no breach of clause 7.8 of the Australia Post Enterprise Agreement 2013. She said the information now disclosed by Mr Singh undermined this view. She said it was a matter of fact that the agency staff had not received any superannuation payments, regardless of who they were legally employed by. She also said, 'I am also drawing to your attention once again the regular breach of immigration laws whereby workers on overseas student visas with therefore a restriction of 20 hours work per week are routinely working full hours and overtime.' She could hardly have been clearer, but Australia Post sat on its hands and turned a blind eye to these abuses.

Local managers were sending the student visa holders to get Australia Post security passes and then seeing that the students with limitations on their working hours were working full time and even overtime. It was an open secret in Australia Post for years. The overseas students are unaware of their rights. Those who are aware do not want to enforce their rights, because they have been working full time when they are only supposed to work 20 hours per week. They are really investing in obtaining permanent residence. The end result is that workers' conditions are rubbish—under-award wages, no superannuation and poor health and safety. The Communication Workers Union examined four bikes at Hoppers Crossing. Two were not even registered. When Baljit Singh's were examined at Whittlesea DC, all of them were faulted by Australia Post management. It is too late now for Australia Post to be chest-beating about 'not standing for any improper or illegal behaviour by contractors'. The fact is that these matters were drawn to their attention years ago and they did nothing about it. The action we are seeing now only arises because the Communication Workers Union contacted the Australian Federal Police. If it had been up to Australia Post, this scam would still be happening today. Australia Post's processes and procedures for ensuring mail contractors do the right thing have not been worth a brass razoo.

The Communication Workers Union says that other companies are not much better than Mr Singh in the way they treat their workers. They have case studies of exploitation involving KLMK, Aus-Lanka Express, Danhall and Zion Group. What Australia Post should do is make sure our mail is not being delivered by migrant workers on temporary work visas. The idea that with 800,000 people out of work in this country we cannot find any unemployed or underemployed Australians with the skills necessary to deliver the mail is just ridiculous.

It is not just Australia Post that has been asleep at the wheel. Mr Baljit Singh has not only had labour hire contracts with Australia Post but also been an owner of dodgy international student colleges paid millions of dollars as registered training providers. St Stephens Institute and TK Melbourne Education and Training College stand accused of providing fake qualifications to enable overseas students to get Australian visas. Despite whistleblowers providing evidence to the Australian Skills Quality Authority and to the immigration department about mismanagement, corruption, visa rorting and bribery, these colleges remain open for business.

Investigative reporters Nick McKenzie and Richard Baker from Fairfax hit the nail right on the head when they said:

Shonky colleges are creating a new underclass of migrant workers in Australia who are ... at risk of exploitation. Some readily agree to accept substandard pay and conditions in order to get a visa and a chance at obtaining permanent residency.

Exactly. They also said:

The visa rorting cottage industry is alive and well.

They are right about that too. The federal government needs to cut back these migrant worker programs, the dodgy student colleges, the ripping off of overseas workers and the neglect of the Australian ones which accompany them.

In the private sector we have Woolworths. Last week I addressed a rally at the Broadmeadows Town Hall, together with the member for Calwell, protesting against Woolworth's plans to close its Hume distribution centre in Broadmeadows. This decision is a slap across the face to both the workers who have served Woolworths loyally for many years and the Broadmeadows community which is battling with unemployment of over 23 per cent. Broadmeadows already has unemployment of Greek or Spanish proportions. These have been, until now, secure jobs that you can raise and feed a family with. It is very hard to find jobs like those in today's world of casual, part-time, insecure work. Victorian workers are struggling to find enough hours in record numbers with our underemployment rate now at its higher level in almost 40 years. Nine point five per cent of Victoria's workforce is now classified as underemployed—the highest percentage since the Bureau of Statistics started keeping records. Against this unfortunate background, the proposed closure of the Woolworths distribution centre in Broadmeadows will see up to 700 families lose an income and will have a devastating effect on what is already a disadvantaged area.

At the end of Jun, I held a Wills unemployment forum in Coburg due to my concern about the rise in local unemployment. That forum was really well attended and I was very encouraged by the positive suggestions put forward by people there, including our regional development experts. One of the things we discussed was making Melbourne's northern suburbs a food manufacturing precinct, building on the industry that we already have and building on the establishment of the fruit and vegetable market in Epping. Woolworths have the chance to be part of that. I urge them to rethink this decision and not blow that chance.