Labor’s work visa push
Plan to lift skilled migrant wages to avoid cheap labour
AUSTRALIAN companies would be forced by a Labor government to raise the minimum wage for skilled migrants to ensure foreign staff are not used as cheap replacements for local workers.
Opposition Leader Bill Shorten will announce today that if Labor wins the May 18 poll, his government will overhaul the skilled worker visa system so it is no longer cheaper to pay an overseas worker.
Central to the policy will be a lifting of the Temporary Skilled Migration Income Threshold, which is the lowest wage that a worker can be paid under a 457-style visa.
The Rudd Labor Government froze the threshold at $53,900 in July 2013, and it has remained there since. It will be lifted to $65,000, and indexed annually.
Mr Shorten will also promise to close loopholes that allow employers to meet the threshold by artificially inflating salaries, such as by offering greater or excessive overtime hours and providing substandard accommodation.
The crackdown will also examine how best to close loopholes allowing some temporary visa-holders to be paid less than provided for in enterprise agreements or awards.
“When businesses use overseas workers as a cheap replacement for local workers it contributes to wage stagnation,” Mr Shorten said.
“This will ensure employers are not using overseas workers as a cheap replacement for local workers, protecting Australian wages from being undercut.”
Mr Shorten said where wages were above the minimum threshold, the market salary rate framework would continue to operate.
He said recommendations on the market salary rate framework would be made by a body to be set up with equal representation from government, unions and employers.
Mr Shorten said the measures would give more than one million underemployed Australians a leg-up and address youth unemployment, which at 11.7 per cent is more than double the national average.
He will also pledge to introduce an Australian Jobs Test, so labour agreements can’t be entered into unless they support or create jobs for Australian workers.