Skilled migration cuts divide - Yuko Narushima
- March 17, 2009
John Sutton...wanted charges. Photo: Kirk Gilmour
A SHARP cut to Australia's skilled migration intakeyesterday won support from unions and parts of industry but wascriticised for jeopardising growth and coming too late to save localjobs.
The Government trimmed the number of foreign workersallowed into Australia this financial year by 14 per cent, to 115,000.It also scrapped building jobs from a list of occupations migrantscould fill, saying another paring could follow.
Thecuts, which force employers to source tradesmen such as bricklayers andcarpenters domestically, responded to the dramatic economic decline,the Immigration Minister, Chris Evans, said. "The migration program'sgot to be responsive to the economy," he said.
The skilled migrant quota is 71 per cent full, with three months left in the financial year.
Butthe Opposition spokeswoman on immigration, Sharman Stone, said theGovernment's response was too slow. "It was very clear in October thatemployment prospects were rapidly deteriorating," Dr Stone said.
The cuts to skilled migration were the first since the 1990s and were focused on permanent workers.
The measures to put Australians ahead of overseas workers pleased the unions and building industry.
TheConstruction Forestry Mining Energy Union's national secretary, JohnSutton, said he had called for the changes more than a month ago. "Itwas pretty absurd when we could see our people being retrenched allover the place."
The chief executive of Master BuildersAustralia, Wilhelm Harnisch, said the protection was timely. Theindustry stood to lose 50,000 jobs in the coming year. "Last year wasall about the skills shortage but our fortunes have changed," he said.
But another industry association said cutting immigration now could stifle future economic growth.
"Migrationinto Australia, particularly through the supply of skilled labour,boosts domestic living standards and government revenues," HeatherRidout, the chief executive of AiGroup, said. "Now is not the time tobe cutting back."
Migration could make up a third of Australia's GDP growth in the next decade, she said.
Aspokesman for the Immigration Minister said there were "no plans atpresent to reduce either the family or humanitarian streams". |
发表于 18-3-2009 11:37:21
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