The AFR has reported that the Turnbull Government will today release changes to its modest 457 visa reforms that will water down their impact:
Universities and C-Suite executives are expected to be the winners in a revised list of occupations affected by a crackdown on 457 temporary visas due to be published on Friday.
Immigration Minister Peter Dutton will issue the revised list of occupations for employers to bring in foreign workers to meet skills shortages.
The government stripped back the list of eligible occupations in April, prompting a backlash from a raft of industries that compete for overseas talent.
CEOs were hit by the changes announced in April and are expected to be reinstated in the revised list but with a pay threshold in line with the top tax threshold of $180,000, to prevent rorting of the changes.
The retail and mining sectors have also been lobbying hard but are expected to have mixed feelings about Friday’s revised list after some occupations have been reinstated while others remain excluded.
University lecturers and vice chancellors were also among the occupations affected but after fierce lobbying, Universities Australia is optimistic the government has heeded its concerns.
The Turnbull Government’s announced changes to temporary skilled visas involved:
- Implementing a new two-year temporary visa system that has no path to permanent residency, as well as a four-year scheme for highly skilled positions where there is a proven labour shortage;
- Cutting the range of jobs that foreign workers can apply for by around 200 occupations;
- Mandatory employer-conducted labour market testing for all visas issued under the new scheme; and
- Mandatory English language proficiency.
While these changes sounded good on the surface, they were really a sham and would not have materially reduced the abuse of the ‘skilled’ temporary visa system by employers. Here’s why.
First and most importantly, the appallingly low pay floor of $53,900 (non-indexed) for non-CEOs has been retained, which is 35% below the average full-time salary of $82,789. Thus, employers will still be incentivised to hire cheap foreign labour over locals, and the temporary skilled visa system will continue to undermine the pay and working conditions of local workers.
Second, the mandatory labour market testing requirements implemented by the Coalition allow employer-conducted testing rather than from an independent body, and can be easily overcome by placing an ad on social media.
Third, the initially proposed changes to the Consolidated Skilled Occupations List (CSOL) were immaterial, since they would have only reduced the use of temporary skilled visas by 8%. And now the CSOL is expected to be further watered-down, making the Coalition’s reforms even less effective.
Rather than tinkering with the CSOL or bothering with sham market testing, the federal government should simply raise the minimum salary earned by temporary skilled visa workers from the current pitiful level of $53,900 to at least the average full-time earnings (currently $82,789), and preferably higher. These are supposed to be ‘skilled’ workers after all, therefore their salary rates should be set above the national average (which includes unskilled workers), not well below it.
Raising the minimum salary threshold in this way would discourage firms from hiring cheap foreign labour over locals, as has occurred en masse in areas like IT. It would also eliminate the need for labour market testing, and would greatly simplify the whole temporary skilled visa system.
Unless the minimum pay floor is increased substantially, the temporary skilled visa system will continue to be over-used and abused by employers, undermining the pay and working conditions of local workers.
