Brendan O'Connor (Gorton, Australian Labor Party, Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) Share this | Hansard source

I thank the honourable member for Deakin for his question and his ongoing interest in looking after Australian workers. This government will always support Australian workers in jobs and training. Although the 457 visa is often used legitimately, there is clear evidence that in some industries and occupations the 457 visa scheme is not working as intended. Too many 457 sponsors are doing the wrong thing. Two examples will help illustrate that. First, in the IT industry, it is clear that some 457 sponsors are using the scheme to undercut wages and conditions, in effect denying young Australians the opportunity to compete for entry level graduate programming and computing jobs. Second, in hospitality, it is worrying that at a time when vacancies for cooks nationwide are falling, the occupation of cook is becoming the most popular application job. That is a disturbing trend.

The government's approach to this is very straightforward. To get jobs you need skills, and to get skills you need training. That is why the government will expect employers to take seriously the obligation to train. The government is concerned that some users of the 457 scheme, instead of training Australian workers to fill positions, just buy those skills from overseas. Of course, that reflects the approach of the opposition, with state governments taking money out of training and cutting TAFE. 'No problem,' they say. 'We'll just get the skills from overseas.' That is not acceptable. The approach of the opposition to 457s is just Work Choices by another name—and it smells the same too! 'Just let the market rip, and don't worry about how unfair it is on Australian workers.'

In future, employers' access to the 457 program will come with an obligation to make a serious commitment to training their own workers, to training Australian workers, and the government will rigorously enforce—

Mr Briggs interjecting—

this obligation to train.

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