Jobs safe with China free-trade agreement: says Bob Carr

Free-trade agreement does not need to be rewritten to protect workers, says former Labor foreign minister.

Former Labor foreign minister and NSW premier Bob Carr has declared that the China-Australia free-trade agreement does not need to be rewritten to protect the interests of Australian workers.

“The concerns of unions cannot be rejected out of hand but the Chinese FTA doesn’t need to be rewritten,” Mr Carr told The Australian last night.

As the director of the Australia-China Relations Institute at the University of Technology, Sydney, Mr Carr distributed a fact check and series of articles supporting the Abbott government’s claims that Australian jobs would be protected and that 457 foreign-worker visas for China would be treated the same way as for workers from “150 other countries around the world”.

The institute’s fact check said that under the deal the Australian government could require that companies prove they had tried to find workers locally before bringing any from China; that 457 visa workers would be entitled to Australian pay and conditions; and that skilled workers would need to meet any licensing or registration requirements, including tests or skills assessments.

“Some of the expressions used in documents around the FTA seems to have fuelled union concerns,” Mr Carr said. “They deserve­ to be taken seriously but our analysis of the FTA is that any incoming Labor government would have all the mechanisms it needs to protect … Australian workers.”

Trade unions and the Labor Party are waging a campaign against the free-trade deal, including via television advertising, claim­ing that Australian jobs would be lost to Chinese workers under the trade agreement, and those workers would not be paid Australian wages nor be qualified tradesmen.

The government is planning a counter advertising campaign, including on television, against what it describes as “dishonest” advertising about the China deal. The parliament needs to endorse the free-trade agreement and the government could be defeated in the Senate if Labor opposes deal.

Labor trade spokeswoman Penny Wong called on Tony Abbott­ and Trade Minister Andrew Robb yesterday to answer questions about safeguards for Australian workers.

“The government should be answering questions about this deal, it should be answering questions about why it hasn’t included key safeguards to ensure Australian jobs,” Senator Wong said.

She said the text of the China deal didn’t contain protection for workers: “It’s quite clear that key safeguards that should have been included to ensure that jobs were available to Australians first have not been included.”

Senator Wong argues that under the China deal’s investment facilitation arrangements, the government’s special migration provisions have “no requirement for labour-market testing”.

“If Mr Abbott was serious about ensuring that ChAFTA will support local jobs, instead of spending $25 million of taxpayer funds advertisin­g the deal he would address­ community concerns and fix the agreement,” she said.

“Labor will fight to ensure there are safeguards around ChAFTA’s temporary migration provisions because we believe trade should enhance local job opportunities, not put them at risk.”

Mr Robb argues that protect­ions for Australian workers and restrictions on 457 visas would apply to the Chinese agreement and there would no change to existing laws which require Australian employers to seek Australians to fill vacancies before bringing in foreign workers on 457 visas.

James Laurenceson, the deputy director of UTS’s ACRI, said the deal’s memoran­d­um of understanding on investment facil­ita­tion arrange­ments says the Aust­ralian government can require companies to prove they have tried to find workers locally before seeking to bring any from China.