Tactician Peter Dutton comes up Trumps on 457 visa axing
THE PM is taking a page from the current mastermind of populist politics, Donald Trump by dumping 457 visas but it’s Immigration Minister Peter Dutton who has really come up Trumps.
Opinion
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MALCOLM Turnbull is taking a page from the current mastermind of populist politics, Donald Trump.
With the slogan “Buy American and Hire American”, Trump will use an executive order to cut back on the number of foreign workers taking American jobs — a policy which has already caused considerable concern in Silicon Valley.
As Opposition Leader Bill Shorten tours regional Queensland, an area where One Nation is generating momentum, the Turnbull Government came out not with a slight reform to the flawed 457 visa program but a clean wipe-out.
TURNBULL: MIGRATION MUST BE IN THE NATIONAL INTEREST
Turnbull has got the politics of the announcement right. He is focusing on Aussie jobs and stopping foreigners from using the 457s as a backdoor to Australian citizenship.
Unsurprisingly, the bold idea to scrap the 457 program and start afresh with a new program is understood to have been Immigration Minister Peter Dutton’s.
He has been campaigning on the issue, with front page stories in this newspaper, since November — highlighting how Labor had allowed foreigners to take jobs from Aussies.
It was big news when Dutton announced he was banning foreigners from working in fast-food outlets in February: the headline of The Tele was Burger Off.
Turnbull and Dutton had discussed scrapping the program late last year at a meeting in the PM’s office. The argument was that the brand of 457s had been trashed and was beyond repair.
Cabinet process on the new program began in January but it took a while to work out the employment list.
The axing of 457 visas is the first instalment of the Government agenda of tightening up citizenship in the space of Australian visas.
Dutton is also planning to introduce tougher tests to determine who gets a visa to Australia.
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