Official inquiry backs concerns over foreign worker visas and exploitation
LABOUR hire companies must be held responsible for their actions, and there is urgent need for changes to the $170 billion franchise industry.
These are some of the key recommendations from a Senate inquiry into foreign worker exploitation.
After a year long investigation and 10 public hearings the inquiry — chaired by Senator Sue Lines — released its report earlier this month, titled “A National Disgrace: The Exploitation of Temporary Work Visa”.
During the investigation, billionaire and Australian 7-Eleven founder, Mr Russell Withers (below) conceded there was ‘something wrong’ following revelations of workers exploitation across the franchise.
“We’ve recognised there is a problem. My company will fix it, and we will do everything in our power to make sure this doesn’t happen again,” Mr Withers said.
Underpaid 7-Eleven workers were physically intimidated, and even beaten, to discourage them from seeking repayment of wages owed, the senate inquiry was told.
But evidence revealed the 7-Eleven experience was just one of many.
Increasing reliance on workers here on temporary visas is in nobody’s long-term interest, The Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) told the inquiry.
In its submissions the ACTU pointed out the short-term interests of employers are not necessarily consistent with either the long-term national interest or the interests of migrant workers:”This trend towards temporary and employer-sponsored migration is effectively outsourcing decisions about our national migration intake to employers and their short-term needs, over the national interest and a long- term vision for Australia’s economy and society.”
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Union concerns are backed by evidence from thousands of exploited staff here on temporary working visas.
Following evidence from some of these workers, the senate committee warned of “pervasive abuse of the working holiday visa program by a network of labour hire companies supplying 417 visa workers,,,”.
And official statistics show there are 1.3 million foreign workers on temporary visas — that’s one in 10 workers.
Unions fear the influx is creating a major problem that could get escalate if it isn’t addressed.
For example, a recent United Voice survey reveals of more than 200 international students, 25 per cent were receiving $10 or less an hour, 60 per cent were earning less than the national minimum wage and a massive 79 per cent knew little or nothing about their rights at work.
In many cases the workers are too afraid to speak out for fear of being deported or are threatened they will put their families at risk back home.
Workers brave enough to speak out tell of lives where 70-hour working weeks are common for pay well below the miniumum wage.
For example, Edwin De Castro, a Filipino 457-visa worker says he came as a construction worker hoping for a better life.
”We were six in one bedroom and another in a shipping container — while they were deducting $250 each week for each of us for our accommodation,” Mr De Castro said in recent evidence to the inquiry.
De Castro and dozens like him were brought in by a labour hire company to work on a building site in Narrabri, NSW, until they were evicted from their accomodation and dismissed without notice.
