The push for guest workers
Editorial; 29/4/08
Australia has long resisted pressure to admit unskilled, short-term guest workers from its Pacific neighbours, yet the idea continues to gather support - and from unlikely quarters. A century ago, the Australian Workers Union helped fashion the White Australia Policy, partly to keep out island labour. Today, the union says Australia’s labour shortage makes it hard to oppose unskilled guest workers, as long as they are not exploited, and that paying people to work is preferable to aid handouts. The former foreign minister, Alexander Downer, says he argued, unsuccessfully, for such a scheme, and “there is no reason to believe it can’t work”. Such a program is commonly described as a win-win situation: guest workers would acquire capital, experience and ideas, and Australian farmers would no longer lose money from unpicked crops.
See: http://www.smh.com.au/editorial/index.html
Tags: Australia, Migrants & Refugees, Workers