Dan Tehan (Wannon, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration and Citizenship) | Hansard source

What is it about Labor and immigration? Every time they touch it, it's a complete and utter disaster. Just look at the debate going on at the moment. We have a housing crisis, a rental crisis, congestion issues and environmental issues, and they're bringing 1.5 million people in. Where are they going to be housed? What is it doing to rents? Every time Labor touches immigration, it is a complete and utter mess.

Look at this now with their changes to the PALM scheme. They won't consult. They don't go and ask, 'If you're employing people from the Pacific islands, what can we do to make sure that a few bad apples can't exploit workers?' Properly consult. Properly engage. Do the right thing. Instead, what do they do? They say, 'We'll put bureaucratic regulations in place, and we'll give the bureaucrats the option that, if they think there are exceptional circumstances, we might allow an employer to change some of the rules, like if there's been a flood, or if, say, insects damage or destroy a crop. Then the bureaucrats here in Canberra might be able to make a change.'

Why won't Labor consult properly? Why won't they look at schemes like this, which are working well, and then say, 'Okay, if we need to make some small changes because we're worried about this or that, then we will consult properly to come up with a way to deal with those bad apples.' Instead, they just want to make it harder for everyone, and, at the same time, what they do is they make it harder for Australian businesses, who are paying taxes, which, of course, allow Australians to get educated, go to hospitals and get the services that they need.

What we need to see from the Labor Party is proper and serious engagement on this with business so that business isn't impacted by it. In doing that, we can also make sure that those businesses are doing everything they can to continue to engage Pacific workers because the remittances from the PALM are absolutely vital for those Pacific nations. Making sure that this program works is in everyone's interest. It's in our national interest, and it's obviously in the interest of those Pacific nations, which is why—and the previous speaker mentioned it—we're opposed to the Pacific engagement visa. Who else but the Labor Party would come up with the idea that, to get permanent residency in this country, we're going to have a lottery. Not only that, we're going to get you to pay money to put yourself in that lottery. Permanent residency has been debased to a lottery in this nation.

Where do the Labor Party get these ideas? Why is it that, when it comes to immigration, everything they touch is a complete and utter train wreck? It beggars belief. Rightly, Pacific island nations are deeply concerned by this. They're worried that their best and their brightest will be taken and the remittance flow will end. All you're doing is taking the very people who can build the bright future that we all want to see those Pacific nations enjoy.

I sincerely ask the Labor Party to just step back and think, 'Why are we overreaching on these changes to the PALM, a system that we know has worked well?' Alright, there have been some instances where there has been exploitation. We need to address it and we need to fix it, but we need to do it in a way that works with those businesses who use the PALM and who need the PALM because they've advertised and tried in every way they can to get Australian workers to do the job that they want them to do, but they haven't been able to. Instead we've got this very good scheme which enables us to boost the Pacific through remittances and also to make sure that we can get the job done that we need to get done.

Labor always makes a mess of immigration when it's in power. We all know it. Try doing nothing. It might help, rather than changes like these.

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