Michaelia Cash (WA, Liberal Party, Assistant Minister for Immigration and Border Protection) Share this | Hansard source

Let us be very clear: we have just heard from the Australian Greens, who have moved the disallowance motion. They have confirmed by their words that there is only one threat to Australian jobs this afternoon and that is in this disallowance motion being agreed to. I want to make it very clear to those listening to this debate that, if this motion is agreed to, the immediate impact on the vote being declared will be that noncitizens and non-permanent residents working in the offshore oil and gas industry will have to down tools to prevent them from being in breach of their visa conditions. I want to say that again, so everybody listening is very clear of what will happen if this disallowance motion is agreed to. The offshore oil and gas industry in Australia is at risk of grinding to a halt this afternoon if the Labor Party join together with the Australian Greens and support the disallowance motion.

When you want to talk about the impact on Australian jobs, I truly hope that the shadow minister for immigration has given you all talking points. I hope the MUA have got their press release ready, because they will be explaining to the Australian workers in the maritime industry and to all of the workers who are affected by the downstreaming of this industry that their jobs are in jeopardy because the disallowance motion gets agreed to.

If Labor members and senators, and in particular senators because they will be voting on this motion, are truly concerned about the jobs of Australians and the interests of their union members, I would say to them: please recognise the necessity of these multibillion-dollar operations being able to use what is a very small number of highly specialised international workers who are integral to the operations of the companies that are currently providing jobs for thousands of Australians as a result of the fact that they are prepared to do business in this country. If you want to launch a campaign to stop Australian jobs this afternoon rather than keep Australians working in this industry, then support the disallowance motion. But I say to each and every senator who will be casting a vote: do so at your peril or, in the next 15 minutes, phone your shadow minister and find out what the true impact of this disallowance will be. I can assure you that jobs will be in jeopardy when the vote is declared because it is at that point that all of those people who are here on visas will no longer be able to undertake the work that they are doing.

I understand the shadow minister for immigration's instruction to Labor senators is to support this disallowance. The shadow minister is either blissfully ignorant of the effect the disallowance on what are Labor Party union members—and if that is the case then, quite frankly, he should resign—or perhaps, more worryingly, he is actually putting the interests of the MUA—one of the most militant unions in Australia—above the national interest and above the interests of those Australian workers who this afternoon, right now, are out there relying on the oil and gas industry to give them a job.

I refer to the shadow minister's potential ignorance in the press release that he issued yesterday accusing the government of trying to replace the offshore resource worker visa class. I would like to confirm with the Senate no such visa actually exists. Perhaps, though, it does exist as a figment of the shadow minister's imagination because, I can tell you now, there is no such visa.

Labor support of this motion is nothing more and nothing less to do with pressure that has been put on the Labor Party by the MUA, who have been trawling the corridors of this place for a number of days now. We know that they are one of the most militant unions in Australia. They are exercising this influence all because they want to have control over the 15 per cent of the highly specialised international workers who carry out work in Australian waters in support of the offshore oil and gas industry. The only reason, for those listening in to this debate, that those workers are now even in the migration zone is because Minister O'Connor, as one of his parting gifts to the Australian public, on the final day of the parliament in 2013, rammed the legislation through the Senate with less than three minutes of debate.

This motion is not directed at immigration policy, far from it. The motion is intended to inflict harm on the oil and gas sector as a sector of the mining industry, which the Australian Greens are sworn to destroy. This is an issue about sovereign risk. If Labor supports the motion, it will send a very clear message to global industry that Australia cannot be relied upon to support the oil and gas industry operating in Australian waters. I remind senators this is a global industry which determines the allocation of billions of dollars of exploration and operating expenditure according to international risk.

If the disallowance is agreed to, these specialists currently employed on oil and gas installations in the migration zone will immediately become unlawful non-citizens under the Migration Act. This raises very serious questions as to whether or not contractual obligations that have been entered into by oil and gas companies will be affected. Quite frankly, the issue was raised that if they are affected and there are damages, will they be able to sue the Australian taxpayer for compensation?

I am aware of false claims by those advocating for the disallowance motion that disallowing the ORA regulations will compel the industry to use the subclass 457 visa. I can tell you that is completely, totally and utterly incorrect. I say to senators, if you are supporting the disallowance on the basis of that claim, please think again; it is wrong. The effect of that disallowance will be to prevent the use of any prescribed visa, including the subclass 457 visa. The effect of this, as I already stated, is that a person who is not an Australian citizen or a permanent resident will be in breach of their temporary visa conditions if the disallowance is agreed to and they continue to participate in or to support offshore resources activity in the migration zone.

The next allegation I want to address is that the government's regulation is somehow opening the floodgate for the industry to use foreign workers instead of Australian workers. Again, that is completely, totally and utterly incorrect. To anyone making that allegation, I say this to you: it shows that you have a complete lack of any form of any understanding of the offshore oil and gas industry internationally. Senators will be aware that the offshore oil and gas industry is a global industry and it relies upon the capacity to be able to transfer workers with specialist skills from project to project and from country to country. Without having access to this highly specialised international labour, which represents but a small fraction of those who are directly employed in the industry, I can tell you right now that this industry will not continue to exist in Australia and that is exactly what the Australian Greens want.

We will be the only jurisdiction globally to regulate these workers. And it is pretty obvious that when you are the only jurisdiction internationally doing something, you create an automatic issue of sovereign risk because future decisions of global companies in the oil and gas industry determine the allocation of billions of dollars of exploration and operational expenditure according to international risk. The offshore oil and gas industry has about $200-billion worth of major projects either under construction or in operation. The maritime support sector employs about 2,500 people and this estimated by Deloitte Access Economics to create up to 10,000 flow-on jobs. Again, those jobs will be put at risk if this disallowance motion is agreed to.

In relation to the claims that have been made of the exploitation of foreign workers not on 457 or 400 visas, senators should understand that approximately 85 per cent of workers working in this area, in this sector, on specialist offshore resource vessels are Australian employees and 100 per cent of those on fixed installations, such as rigs, are Australian residents and they are paid in full accordance with Australian laws, they are superannuated in accordance with Australian laws and these workers pay tax just like any other Australian employee.

It is the remaining 15 per cent of workers in this sector—and they are the international highly skilled specialists—who are paid in accordance with international maritime law, including the rules set by the International Labour Organization and the Maritime Labour Convention 2006, which Australia has ratified. These are the people who the industry is not going to have access to as of this disallowance motion going through. Remember this: it is those highly specialised workers who create the Australian jobs—not the other way around. Any way you look at this, this is an international industry working under very specific conditions, and those conditions are going to be disallowed with this motion.

In terms of the effect on the specialists currently employed on oil and gas installations in the migration zone on an offshore resources activity, again, if the disallowance is agreed to, these specialists will become unlawful noncitizens under the Migration Act, These specialists carry out such roles as captain, chief engineer, first mate and ships electrician, and they are a vital part of keeping this multibillion dollar vessel operating. If the disallowance is supported, these ships, with their international crews, will not be able to work in Australian waters and participate in an offshore resources activity.

These multibillion dollar vessels are in demand globally, and it is a fact that, if they cannot crew these vessels with their own highly skilled specialists, whom they use internationally, as, for the majority of time, whether it is in Brazilian waters, Italian waters, waters off the coast of Africa or in Australia, the crew follows the ship, and they do not get access to that labour—and I again say to senators in this place, please be aware of what you are voting for when the vote is called—that potentially means a flow-on effect to the thousands of Australians who, at this present point in time, at 18 minutes past six, are currently employed. And it will not be because of this side of the chamber that they lose their jobs.

Offshore oil and gas facilities employ hundreds of Australian workers, and those workers know the vital part played by these specialists in keeping the offshore facilities operating effectively and safely. These Australian workers know the operational value and the skills they bring to the projects and why there is a need to employ these specialists. These Australian workers want to know that their jobs will not be threatened by the forced removal of these specialist operators. The Greens are well and truly using this motion to put in jeopardy the jobs of Australian workers because they hate the oil and gas industry internationally and they hate the mining industry—and anything they can do, even under the guise of telling people it is about Australian jobs, when they know it is not—they will do. The Greens are a party where sovereign risk does not appear on their radar.

In the short time I have left, I want to take the Senate to a case study of the Allseas Australia's workforce strategy to underline the importance of highly skilled international workers to ensuring the ongoing jobs of Australian workers:

Such is the highly specialised nature of Allseas’ work that its pipelay vessels on current Australian projects, Lorelay and Highland Navigator, operate with full-time international crews. Lorelay is the larger of the two and comprises 25 non-Australian nationals, trained at Allseas’ state-of-the-art facility, who travel with the 236 metre ship wherever she is needed.

In other words, the crew is dedicated to the ship. As was stated by Allseas Australia regional manager Willem

van Benten:

If we were to work in Argentina or in South Africa or anywhere else in the world, we fly the people to the place that is used to run the crew changes; they travel to the vessel the next day by helicopter or crew boat and, after their four to six week period offshore, they then go back to their place of abode where they have their family.

Regardless of where we are operating, the vessel comes with about 25 international crew who remain with the vessel and are really the management of the vessel. This is where the special skills sets of controlling or operating and maintaining the vessel is concerned, they provide that expertise and know-how.

On Lorelay we use Brunel Technical Services to provide all of our blue-collar labour and the foremen to supervise and run those crews.

They are in partnership with Australian labour hire companies for the majority of the positions in these contracts, and on that particular vessel that is approximately 100 to 110 Australian workers.

He goes on to say:

Then for the nautical aspects, concerning the ship’s duties like taking stores on board, maintaining the engine room and providing catering services to the ship’s whole complement, we contract Programmed Total Marine Services—which is around 40 additional people.

Australian workers—

15 places on board are taken by the customer, in this case Chevron, for supervision and quality control; and then we have some quality control of our own which can be a mix of Australian and non-Australian nationals.

But from a total complement of 215 workers on board Lorelay, we have 140 or 150 Australian people doing those tasks that are more universal. So when we are in Australia—those positions go to Australians.

This idea that Allseas is taking jobs from Australians is a myth; really our ships are creating many times the opportunities for locals than are taken by the foreign crew.

Again I say to the Senate, please remember that the workers Allseas gets jobs for, because they bring their vessels into Australian waters and they contract with Australian labour hire firms to have those people brought out to the rigs or to the ships, they are the workers you will be doing out of a job if this disallowance goes through because all of the highly specialised labour currently working at 6.23 pm, will be unlawful citizens and unable to perform their duties under the Migration Act.

I say to senators, if you are truly concerned about the employment of Australian workers and the interests of your union members, you will see the necessity of these multibillion dollar operations to access what is a small number of highly specialised international workers who are integral to the companies securing the ongoing employment of Australian workers. If you want to stop that overnight, in fact if you want to stop it in but a few minutes, support the disallowance motion because that will be the effect of this disallowance motion going through. I conclude by asking all senators to have regard for the ongoing jobs of Australian oil and gas workers and the workers in downstream industries and not put these Australian workers' future is in jeopardy. I ask you: please act in the national interest because if you do not you are likely to bring a global industry in Australia to a standstill tonight.