AUSTRALIAN IMMIGRATION NEWS

Labor set to bin union input

Thursday, 29 March 2007

The Australian Labour Party (ALP) plans to stop unions from making decisions on whether a business should be allowed to recruit temporary skilled migrants. The plan comes as a bid by the ALP to show that the party recognises the need for employer sponsored visas, despite continuous campaigns against their abuse.

Labor would also re introduce the requirement of labour market testing to determine whether local workers were available to fill the positions and to force employers to pay temporary migrants market rates.

The revised platform to be debated at the ALP national conference next month, says a Labor government would abolish regional certifying bodies, which evaluate employer applications for temporary migrants in areas considered ‘regional’.

They would be replaced by local job protection authorities, which would verify labour market testing had occurred to ensure “sponsored overseas labour does not displace Australian workers and that remuneration is not undercutting local market rates.”

Details on how these new bodies would function and what labour market testing would be required have yet to be released. Labor Immigration spokesman Tony Burke said discussions were continuing with businesses and major migration firms.

Several years ago, the government removed the requirement for labour market testing before an employer sponsors a temporary skilled migrant but introduced a mandatory minimum salary level (MSL) as a stand-in. Labor and the unions have since argued that the MSL, of $37,665 in regional areas, is below market rates in some industries, though employers have argued the opposite and called for the MSL to be removed.

Immigration Minister Kevin Andrews has defended the MSL and said he intended for it to increase each year.