Judith Troeth (Victoria, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I present the report of the Employment, Workplace Relations and Education Committee, Perspectives on the future of the harvest labour force, together with the Hansard record of proceedings and documents presented to the committee.

Ordered that the report be printed.

I seek leave to move a motion in relation to the report.

Leave granted.

I move:

That the Senate take note of the report.

This report, Perspectives on the future of the harvest labour force, has been an extremely interesting report to make. I would like to thank my fellow senators, particularly Senator Barnett, Senator Marshall, who is not here in the parliament today, and Senator McEwen and Senator Campbell, who were interested participants in the inquiry.

The question of using contract labour from the Pacific Islands is not a new one in the sense that there have been many answers posed as to what the growing industry of horticulture could use to take the crop off on a seasonal basis when such labour can be quite difficult to find. Horticulture is a growing industry. Based on my agricultural experience, I think it is something like the third-largest agricultural industry in this country. Its production and harvest are characterised usually by short, intense growing periods at the end of which, there can be no doubt, the fruit has to be harvested straightaway so as to get the product in premium condition. Australia has made a great name for itself in export markets by producing first-class citrus, mangoes, olives, avocados and other stone fruit, which usually occur in the November to March period when temperatures are hotter. Therefore, this sort of work is usually done under very hot working conditions, which some people may consider to be unpleasant.

There have been intermittent labour shortages in horticulture. At present, the picking force, if I can term it that, is usually made up of backpackers, many of whom undertake this sort of work as a way of boosting their income during their working holiday maker trips to Australia. Many of them are on a 12-month visa and can work for only a particular amount of time—although I was pleased to see that the department of immigration have extended their possible stay by making it possible for them to have a second term, provided that they work in regional and rural areas on their first job. So backpackers are a part of the labour market.

The section of the population often termed ‘grey nomads’—that is, usually semiretired or retired people over the age of 40 or 50 who have decided to travel around Australia as a way of spending their retirement—often take up this sort of work to provide themselves with extra funds. It was pointed out to us that that supply of labour is less reliable now that the conditions for Centrelink payments revolve around fortnightly reporting of income rather than annual averaging reporting of income, and that people are not so willing to do it because of the fluctuating nature of their income.

As well as that, there is still what I might call a permanent part-time local and itinerant labour force of people that have made a career out of picking fruit. They often used to move from Queensland down through New South Wales to the Riverina area of Victoria and thus get perhaps six months of picking. But because of unreliability of transport, possibly the cost of petrol and the level and standard of accommodation that is often provided, this is seen as less reliable. Pickers, and particularly some of the farming and horticultural organisations, say to us that they cannot get workers.

The report talks about the conditions that they sometimes have. For instance, in paragraph 2.18, the report discusses the evidence of a picker with over 20 years experience and the wages that he got. The farming organisations told us that even if they offered higher wages, given that this is a fairly low-wage form of income, they would not be able to get local labour and that that was why they were looking for alternative sources of labour. The very experienced picker with 20 years experience that spoke to the committee told us that because pickers are paid on piece rates—that is, per piece of fruit picked—it does not necessarily result in higher wages. Often the picking was slowed down because of the fact that pickers would have to grade the fruit at the same time, which often resulted in lower wages. It also depended on the quality of the crop. He also said to us that some farms were managed worse than others, which could mean a great reduction in the quality of the fruit. Also, as I said, there are the travel costs.

The farming organisations were very strong about the fact that they needed labour but, apart from anecdotal accounts, the committee was unable to discern that there was a permanent shortage of labour in this field. It is certainly intermittent, but we had varying descriptions of the shortages that farmers have. Balanced against that, of course, we have to look at the arguments against importing contract labour from the Pacific Islands. There has certainly been heightened sensitivity about entry arrangements for foreign workers amongst political parties during the last 12 months. Certainly, the 457 visa arrangements, which bring in skilled workers, would preclude harvest workers. The ACTU and some other organisations put to us that local employment would be affected. Some community action groups who would like to see more labour come into their area advocated Chinese workers rather than Pacific islands workers, but the committee, I think it is fair to say, did not treat this as a serious component of the argument.

There has been a Canadian experiment along those lines—importing Mexican workers—but, although it had some advantages, the fact that Mexican workers were tied to one farm for the total duration of their visa would, we thought, sometimes mean that, if conditions on that farm proved to be unsatisfactory, the worker would have no recourse and would have to keep on working in substandard conditions, and it would not be a success. There was also the problem of people who may overstay their visa at the end of their contract and perhaps disappear into the community.

Certainly as a government member on this committee I felt that domestic concerns were a priority and we had to look at the question of importing foreign labour as against using our own. There is no doubt that heavy investment in agriculture is to come in the future. We looked at thousands of acres that have been put in, in almonds, avocados and olives. All of those may well be mechanically harvested, but the high premium that Australian growers can get for unblemished, perfect fruit often means that the fruit has to be picked and graded by hand. The prospect of having a labour force imported from the Pacific islands may be more likely in the future.

I think it is fair to say that some members of the committee perhaps changed their minds during the course of this. This started off as a references committee inquiry. We were looking at what we might decide, and I anticipated that we would perhaps bring down a majority report and a minority report. The committee, almost at the end of this inquiry, became the substantive committee under the Senate committee changes, but I think it is fair to say that the committee had decided on the sort of report that it was going to make before the committee changed. I mention that change in committee for the information of the Senate.

I am pleased that it is virtually a consensus report. I would like to thank very much the deputy chair, Senator Gavin Marshall, who is not here, the other Labor members, the other committee members and the staff, particularly Mr John Carter, the committee secretary. Every effort was made to see that we had a varied range of opinion from pickers—as I said, one of whom we saw—community representatives who undoubtedly had the benefits for their region at heart and the residents of Robinvale, where a pilot program with workers from Tonga is almost in place. Certainly everyone contributed. I would like to thank those members who travelled to the Far North, which I did not. We did get as wide a view as possible and I am satisfied that the committee has brought down a comprehensive report which states the facts in a plain but interesting manner.