Turnbull government makes changes to 457 visas for skilled foreign workers

Immigration Minister Peter Dutton unveils changes to 457 visas, making life much harder for skilled foreign workers.

Immigration Minister Peter Dutton has reduced the time 457 visa holders can remain in Australia after their employment ceases from 90 to 60 days.

The Turnbull government has announced changes to the 457 visa for skilled foreign workers reducing the time they can remain in Australia after their employment ceases from 90 to 60 days.

Immigration Minister Peter Dutton made the announcement this afternoon, which will come into effect on Saturday.

Mr Dutton said the change would assist in ensuring that the 457 program meets its intent of acting as a supplement to, rather than a substitute for, Australian workers, as well as reducing likelihood of 457 visa holders, who are only permitted to work for an approved sponsor and who are not eligible for unemployment benefits, entering into informal employment arrangements and being exploited.

Mr Dutton said the Australian government was committed to ensuring that Australian workers have priority and to reducing the potential for exploitation.

“This change is about reducing competition from overseas workers for those Australians who are actively looking for work” he said in a statement.

“The government values the contribution made by the many skilled persons who work in Australia on 457 visas, but where there is an Australian worker ready, willing and able to perform a role it is the Government’s policy that they have priority”

He said the government’s approach compared with that of the former Labor government, which increased the time that 457 visa holders may remain in Australia when they cease employment from 28 days to 90 days in June 2013.

“When Labor’s Shadow Minister for Employment Brendan O’Connor was immigration minister he extended the time from 28 days to 90 days citing a need to allow 457 workers more time ‘to look for another job’,” Mr Dutton said.

“This is yet another example of Labor selling Australian workers short.

“Labor’s mismanagement saw the Subclass 457 program grow from around 68,000 primary visa holders at the end of June 2010 to more than 110,000 when they were removed from office.

“In comparison, under the Coalition the number of 457 visa holders in Australia has fallen by around 13,000, while over the same period almost half a million new jobs have been created for Australian workers”

The reduction from 90 days to 60 days will apply to 457 visas granted on, or after, 19 November 2016.

Mr Dutton said the change to the 457 visa arrangement was gazetted in October.

As at September 30, there were 95,700 skilled migrants in Australia on 457 visas, with about 76,400 secondary visa holders, family members, accompanying them.\

Reaction: ‘a retrograde step’

The changes to the 457 visa are a retrograde step which will increase the vulnerability of foreign workers, according to a leading employment migration expert.

University of Adelaide Senior Lecturer Joanna Howe said the measures went against the recommendations of an independent review chaired by then Fair Work commissioner Barbara Deegan in 2010, which recommended the period be increased from 30 days to at least 90 days.

In 2013 the then Labor government followed Ms Deegan’s and increased the period to 90 days.

Dr Howe said today’s announcement would result in 457 visa holders having very little freedom of movement in the Australian labour market and increase the power employers could exert over foreign workers.

“It effectively gives employers the dual role of both employer and immigration sponsor,” she said.

“By having two hats, which they don’t have with a local worker, the employer’s power is increased to a point where they can exert pressure over a worker to get them to do whatever they want them to do.

Dr Howe said the problem with the 457 visa system was that the list of occupations it covers extends beyond areas of genuine shortage.

Dr Howe said that if the Coalition was really serious about increasing opportunities for Australian workers, it needed to reduce from more than 600 the number of occupations eligible for 457 visas and focus on areas of genuine shortage.

She said both the 90 days and the reduction in the list of occupations had been recommendations of a review the government commissioned in 2014.

“As it is 457 visa holders already have little job security,” Dr Howe said.

“This will make them far more vulnerable.”

“How can the government be launching its migrant worker taskforce chaired by Alan Fels and claiming it’s concerned about worker exploitation, and in the same month substantially increase vulnerability with this?

“It just doesn’t make sense. It’s incoherent.”

Dr Howe said that while she had a problem with Bill Shorten’s language around foreign workers stealing Aussie jobs, he was correct that the main problem with the 457 visa system was insufficient regulation

Labor’s ‘Australia first’ rhetoric

Meanwhile Bill Shorten has continued championing his “Australia First” rhetoric on foreign workers as he tours regional Queensland, highlighting legislation Labor introduced when it was last in government to crack down on 457 visas.

Visiting earthmoving equipment supplier Komatsu in the northern Queensland town of Mackay, the Opposition Leader singled local LNP member George Christensen out for attack.

Mr Christensen yesterday declared that he would be writing to the Prime Minister, Deputy Prime Minister, Employment and Immigration Ministers to request that no further 457 visas be issued for jobs in the Central and North Queensland regions due to high unemployment rates there.

Mr Shorten accused Mr Christensen of doing one thing in Mackay and another in Canberra.

“When Labor toughened up the visa rules back in 2013, Malcolm Turnbull, (Immigration Minister) Peter Dutton and George Christensen all voted for slacker rules,” he said.

“We don’t mind if the government comes on board with what we are talking about, but let’s also be clear: there will be some role for overseas people to come and do skilled jobs which we don’t have the skills to do. “So George is going down one path, he just wants to muddy up the picture so he can talk tough. I just wish George would vote for better standards in our labour markets.”

The number of 457 visas being issued has declined significantly since Mr Shorten was employment minister, but Labor says this is due to the end of the mining boom.

Mr Shorten said he backed Labor’s record of standing up for workers.

“I’ve never seen George Christensen out there backing an increase in the minimum wage, never seen George Christensen or Malcolm Turnbull out there backing Labor toughening up these visa laws, as we did,” he said.

“The question you have to ask of Malcolm Turnbull, Peter Dutton and George Christensen as they’re trying to do their belated window dressing, their fake support for workers, is when Labor proposed to help improve the governance, the regulation of the visa system to make sure that Australians were getting looked after and people weren’t getting ripped off and exploited, they voted no.

“The only reason they’re trying to play catch-up politics now is because they know that Labor’s right.

Shadow Immigration Minister Shayne Neumann said there were around a million people in Australia on temporary work visas.

“If you were to say to Australians there’s a million people on temporary work visas in this country and they’re looking for a job, they’d be saying I want a job for me and my family,” he said.

Mr O’Connor said the changes Labor had made in 2013 meant that they could examine what was happening in the labour market.

“The reason we could do that is that we increased the inspectors tenfold at least, and what that meant is that those Fair Work ombudsmen could go into workplaces and identify where there was exploitation happening, but also where there was misuse, that is a use of a particular occupation when they were not on the shortlist,” he said.

“Let’s look at the shortlist today. As Bill referred to we have carpenters, we have nurses, we have childhood educators that are on that list and yet we know there are increasingly unemployed carpenters, unemployed nurses, so we are very clear, there are locals who have got the skills and cannot fill those jobs because they are being replaced by 457 workers. And also, even when there is a shortage, what is the government doing over the medium and longer term, what’s our medium and long term ambition to equip Australians with the skills in the emerging demand.

“That’s not happening either. 128,000 apprentice places cut by the Turnbull government.

“Malcolm Turnbull, Scott Morrison, Peter Dutton and George Christensen three years ago voted against these protections and these restrictions that Labor put in place, and now they want to talk to us about reform.

“The local member wants to talk about doing something about 457s and yet he voted to stop local labour market testing, he voted to stop the power of the ombudsman to investigate breaches.

“We know they are hollow and insincere when it comes to this issue and that’s why Bill and Labor will continue to ensure that we put Australian workers first.”