Russell Trood (Queensland, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

I want to make some remarks in relation to the Migration Legislation Amendment (Worker Protection) Bill 2008. This bill seeks to strengthen the legislative framework relating to sponsorship of noncitizens coming to work in Australia under what are commonly called 457 visas. It is important legislation, given its focus. It is important because 457 visas have proliferated since they were first introduced in 1997-98. In the first year that they were introduced, 30,880 visas were issued, and in 2007-08 the figure rose to 110,570 visas. So there has been a fourfold increase in the use of these visas over the period of time in which they have been available.

In Queensland, my own state, they have consistently constituted about 17 per cent to 18 per cent of the visas issued nationally—8,000 in 2006-07 and 9,800 in 2007-08. There are currently 19,000 employers making use of 457 visas and they are spread very widely throughout the economy, largely in the professions and also in the trades. The largest categories in my own state, I note, are in the health and medical professions—nurses and particularly medical practitioners. So the health professions in particular, in Queensland at least, have taken full advantage of the opportunities presented by the 457 visas. With numbers so large, it is clear that there is a need to strengthen the legislative framework under which they operate.

The opposition supports this objective and, indeed, it supports the general thrust of the bill. We do have some concerns, however, and, in voicing these concerns, I suppose it is important that I draw attention to the fact that there has been some argument that the 457 visa process has been abused. It has been argued that there has been some bad behaviour in relation to these bills. Before the Senate committee, an argument was put by the representatives from the CFMEU that there were several instances of abuse that could be noted, although the evidence seemed to be a bit vague as to the nature of these abuses. The statistic that arrests my attention is that, over the period of 1997-98 to now, something in the vicinity of 340,000 visas have actually been issued, and there seems to be a relatively small number of abuses that have been recorded. This is not in any way an avalanche of abuses. There has not been rampant contempt for the rules under which the visas have been issued. So I think we should be cautious about accepting the claims that are being made in the public domain, particularly on behalf of the union movement, that this system is in need of substantial change. But there is a need for greater regulation, and the opposition supports that proposition.

The particular concern that I have about it is the kind of legislative technique—if I can describe it in that way—which is being used in relation to the way in which this bill has been introduced. Several witnesses before the Senate committee drew attention to the fact that, whilst the bill laid out a framework of activity, it provided little detail as to the nature of the obligations which employers, and indeed employees, might be obliged to undertake in the future, and these details were going to be provided in the regulations. Mr Kessels from Fragomen, who gave evidence before the committee, said:

What we are all doing is sitting around making submissions and discussing a bill which is essentially just a framework, but the real substance that is going to make the real difference is unknown at this stage, and that is the fundamental problem.

I agree with that proposition. I do think it is a fundamental problem. Mr Kessels’ evidence was by no means the only evidence following that particular line. In fact, there were many witnesses who came to the committee who expressed precisely the same kind of concern about the structure of this piece of legislation.

The difficulty here is that we have no clear idea of the nature of the regulations which might be provided. To say the least, in my view, this is an undesirable way of proceeding. I suppose that there is a possibility that when the coalition was in government we may have, on a few occasions, taken this particular course of action. There may have been occasions when we took this course of action, but I do not necessarily approve of that course of action either. So I do not think that the government can take any comfort from the fact that this may have been a way of proceeding in the past. If this were a trivial matter then we might let it pass through, but we are actually talking about the rights of people and we are talking about issues which are fundamentally important to the way in which we manage businesses and the way it affects our economy. These rules and regulations, when they eventually emerge, could in fact have quite a profound impact on both employers and employees. But we do not have, as Mr Kessels said, any real clear idea about how onerous they may well be when they are turned out.

The Senate committee noted that there were a range of concerns. I will not deal with these in detail other than to note that the committee drew attention to the problem of penalties and the enforcement regime that might apply in the regulations. It drew attention to the sanctions that might apply for breaches and, in particular, to concerns about the inspection regime. It also drew attention to what I think are two rather more significant issues. The first of these is the onerous obligations that could well be imposed upon employers as a result of the new regulations. Under these new regulations, it seems that employers will be required to undertake responsibility for costs such as for the education of children, travel and airfares, medical care, and licences and registrations for professions and trades et cetera. All of these have a capacity to impose considerable additional burdens on businesses. For some sponsors, some organisations, some enterprises which already make considerable use of 457 visas, these could be very onerous obligations indeed, particularly for small businesses. We ought to be careful about the consequences of these regulations and the kinds of imposts that we are going to be placing on businesses, particularly small businesses, especially in the economic climate we now find ourselves in.

The second major concern I have is in relation to retrospectivity. We in the coalition have never been enthusiasts for retrospectivity in legislation. It is not entirely clear how retrospectivity might apply in this particular bill, but it seems likely under the framework and the structure that exists that, when the regulations are promulgated, the new obligations will apply to existing 457 arrangements. Employers who have entered into an arrangement with a new employee under a 457 visa might suddenly find themselves hit with very large additional responsibilities which could affect the costs and bottom line of their enterprise. We ought to be very careful about imposing these kinds of imposts on small businesses. I am encouraged by the fact that it seems that the government intends that there be widespread consultation in relation to the new regulations. That is indeed encouraging. Of course, we will look to see that that actually takes place and wait to see that that undertaking is discharged.

In concluding, I just want to make a broad point. There is a great deal in this legislation that is taking place under the regulations and a great deal of which we, at this stage, are unaware. We can speculate and we can guess, but until such time as we see it written down we have absolutely no confidence that this will not in fact impose new and deeply onerous obligations on employers. Whether it is as a result of incompetence, inadvertence or design, we find ourselves in a situation where this kind of legislative technique has been applied in an area which is of very great importance to the economy. I trust that it is not the intention of this government to proceed in this way in relation to much legislation in the future. It seems to me to be a highly undesirable way to deal with matters of considerable importance to employers, to people with small businesses in particular, and to those who might come to Australia on short-term arrangements. We will look forward to the regulations when they appear. We will be giving them close scrutiny, and we hope that there will not be any great surprises in those regulations.