Pacific worker reprieve in coalition migration target
Andrew Brown |
Pacific workers in Australia will not be reduced under proposed opposition changes to migration numbers.
The coalition are yet to unveil their proposed numbers for annual net overseas migration, other than saying it will be tied to the number of new houses constructed.
But opposition home affairs spokesman Jonathon Duniam said any changes to migration would not include cuts to workers in the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility scheme.
The scheme allows businesses to hire workers from nine Pacific countries to fill shortfalls in employment, often in regional areas.
Senator Duniam said the number of Pacific workers coming to Australia each year was low compared to the overall figure.
“The backpacker and PALM contribution to net overseas migration is minimal, … I don’t envisage we’ll be cutting those at all,” he told ABC Radio on Monday.
“It’s a very small number, and to try and put in place changes around the number without regard to who is coming in and where they might be going, what skills shortage or labour shortage they’re trying to fill.
“That’s not going to solve the problem for us.”
The current level of net overseas migration is 301,000 people.
As of June, there were a little more than 32,000 Pacific scheme workers in Australia.
Senator Duniam said the coalition would not unveil the party’s migration policy in 2026, instead choosing to release it closer to the next federal election, which is due by May 2028.
“We need to make sure that we are as relevant to that point in time as possible, taking into account all of the factors and circumstances that the world, the country, will face in 2028,” he said.
“It’s not going to be this year, I don’t think, but sometime in the near future.”
Opposition Leader Angus Taylor would not put an exact number on the coalition’s net overseas migration target.
“But … given what we’re seeing, we’d expect it to be substantially below 200,000 – substantially below,” he told reporters in Queensland.
Migration targets have been in the spotlight after One Nation MP David Farley said the minor party’s figure would include an extra 100,000 people annually, on top of the 130,000 people it already flagged.
The overall number would be slightly higher than the forecast 225,000 people under Labor’s policy.
Party leader Pauline Hanson was forced to clarify One Nation’s stance following Mr Farley’s interview.
Mr Taylor said the differing numbers showed a lack of unity within the party.
“We saw the newly-minted One Nation MP say it was going to be over 230,000 so frankly they’ve got to make up their minds where they sit on all of this – they’re all over the shop,” he said.
AAP