Govt defends temporary migration surge

The federal government has rejected suggestions temporary migrants are taking local
jobs as unions accuse employers of using the system to exploit poor overseas
workers.
The opposition, meanwhile, says the government is ignoring the problem of people
smuggling as it approves the development of a 10-year migration plan.
Australia accepted triple the number of temporary migrants as permanent residents
during the past financial year, official figures show.
Immigration Minister Chris Evans defended the intake, saying temporary migrants,
more than half of whom are international students, are doing the low-paid jobs that
would not otherwise be filled.
He also rejected suggestion foreign fruit pickers and backpackers were taking local
jobs.
"There's no evidence to support that," Senator Evans told Sky News on Monday.
"A lot of these jobs that holiday makers take are in regional areas ... where there
have been labour shortages for years."
Unions, however, say employers are hiring temporary migrant workers from poorer
countries at the expense of local and indigenous workers.
"Generally, they make for a very compliant workforce," John Sutton, the national
secretary of the Construction, Forestry, Mining and Energy Union (CFMEU), told AAP.
"If they're underpaid by our standards, what they're getting is still higher than
what they'd get in Manila or Beijing."
Many temporary migrants had paid a middleman sums of up to $20,000 to come to
Australia in the hope of securing permanent residency with the help of a local
employer, Mr Sutton added.
Immigration Department figures released on Monday showed 657,124 temporary migrants
arrived in Australia during the past financial year.
By comparison, 171,318 permanent migrants came to Australia in the same period, as
the number of skilled migrants was pared back to cope with the economic downturn.
Senator Evans said permanent skilled migration numbers would be reviewed in next
year's budget, but he argued that global conditions warranted the jump in temporary
migration.
The data also showed that employer-sponsored skilled migration surged by 60 per cent
in 2008/09.
Mr Sutton said employer-sponsored migration meant bosses were not training young
Australians - a suggestion Senator Evans rejected.
"That's not right. This government's putting more resources into training young
Australians than any government has in the past," he said.
Cabinet has approved the development of a five- to 10-year plan to consider the
types of migrants Australia needs, where they should settle and the need for extra
housing, transport and other resources.
Senator Evans said that with an ageing population, Australia needed to be a
"relatively large" migration country which could compete with Europe and North
America for the best skilled migrants.
Opposition immigration spokeswoman Sharman Stone said she supported a "rational"
approach to migration, but accused the government of ignoring people smuggling
problems.
"The back door of Australia is ajar", she said.
Dr Stone said nearly 1,300 asylum seekers had arrived in Australia since August
2008, when the federal government scrapped temporary protection visas.