Labor slams ‘much-hyped’ agriculture visa

Labor has taken aim at the newly announced agriculture visa, saying Australian farmers are paying the price for the government’s ­inaction.

Labor senator Kristina Keneally. Picture: Flavio Brancaleone

Labor has taken aim at the newly announced agriculture visa, saying Australian farmers are paying the price for the government’s ­inaction and the visa will subject more workers to exploitative ­conditions.

The specialist visa – unveiled by the Morrison government in August – will allow farmers to source foreign workers from Southeast Asian nations and Britain to help fill critical labour gaps exacerbated by the pandemic.

While the regulation is in force for the scheme, no bilateral deals have been struck with foreign countries to allow workers to travel to Australia under the program.

Writing in The Australian, ­opposition immigration spokeswoman Kristina Keneally and agriculture spokeswoman Julie Collins said the farming sector was bearing the brunt of the Morrison government’s “bungled” policies to tackle worker short­ages: “When it comes to fixing the chronic agriculture workforce shortage, the Morrison-Joyce government continues to fail while farmers are desperate to get their produce to market.”

The Labor frontbenchers said the opposition was concerned the new visa would undermine the new streamlined Pacific Australian Labour Mobility program – which combines the Pacific ­Labour Scheme and the Seasonal Workers Program – at a time when Australia’s relationship with the region “had never been more important”.

“The Seasonal Workers Program and Pacific Labour Scheme are better programs, with more safeguards built in to protect against exploitation. Given a choice between a regulated PLS and SWP and a largely unregulated agriculture visa, why wouldn’t employers choose the latter?”

The National Farmers Federation, which lobbied for an agriculture visa, said the existing foreign workers programs were often too costly for farmers because they required sponsorship of workers over months.

Senator Keneally and Ms Collins also slammed the promise for a “pathway to permanent” for agriculture visa holders, which would need to be legislated.

“The Agriculture Minister has stated previously that the agriculture visa “will be up and running well before Christmas”.

“This is far from the truth. The question the government needs to answer is how many workers will be on Australian farms by Christmas on the new agriculture visa? It’s clear the answer will be zero,” they said.

“The much-hyped Ag Visa is likely to end up hurting Australian workers far more than it helps anyone, including farmers.”

The agriculture visa is designed to complement the streamlined Pacific worker scheme. The Australian revealed last week that the already stalled ­Seasonal Workers Program was under challenge from a proposed class action by Pacific Island workers against labour hire companies accused of exploitation and massive wage theft.

The action threatens to further disrupt a record $73bn harvest this financial year.

Agriculture Minister David Littleproud on Wednesday defended reports of Pacific Island workers being subjected to slave-like conditions under the scheme and accused the ACTU of running a smear campaign against Australian farmers. He said there were a small number of contractors “demonising” workers and accused the union body of falsely claiming the exploitation was rife.

“There are cultural challenges that we are trying to break through but to sensationalise that it’s happening right across the agriculture sector is not correct,” he said. “The reality is we are doing what we can to weed this out to make sure people we have are given the right protections.”