The Federal Government is continuing to ignore warnings over the abuse of temporary migrant workers despite reports that three overseas workers have died on Australian worksites in recent weeks say unions.
This week the Construction Union (CFMEU) and the ACTU have drawn attention to the deaths of three migrant workers in the last month.
Despite the fact that the Federal Government issues and administers the 457 temporary migrant worker visa program, the Minister for Workplace Relations Joe Hockey's only response to these serious workplace accidents has been to state that statistics on workplace accidents were 'kept by the States'.
ACTU President Sharan Burrow said:
"Unions are concerned that the Federal Government is issuing 457 work visas without giving adequate consideration to the safety and conditions of work for the visa holders.
Overseas worker visa holders are often inadequately trained, do not have good language skills to understand safety procedures and lack the support to speak out when their workplaces are unsafe.
This is a recipe for accidents in dangerous industries like construction and forestry," said Ms Burrow.
The Federal Government's recent changes to the 457 visa scheme that increased some penalties for employers found exploiting illegal overseas workers will actually make it much harder for authorities to achieve a successful prosecution, say unions.
Official figures that were recently submitted to a Senate Inquiry by the Government shows that 500 cases of alleged exploitation of temporary visa workers have been investigated this year but around half (232) of the investigations have not yet been completed.
And despite these repeated examples of overseas workers found to have been underpaid, the Government has yet to pass new laws to increase penalties for employers that underpay foreign workers.
Unions are also concerned that the Government plans to increase the number of 457 temporary work visas in the coming year.
Last financial year the Government issued 40,000 of the 457 temporary work visas.
Next year there are estimates that up to 100,000 visas will be issued at the extraordinary rate of around 2,000 temporary visas a week.
"This program is out of control and it is time that the Howard Government responded to community concern over the abuse of temporary overseas work visas," said Ms Burrow.
Two weeks ago the United States State Department even suggested that conditions for some foreign workers in Australia under the 457 special visa scheme constituted 'slavery' but the Howard Government rejected the claims as 'ill informed'.
