It is with disgust that i report that Dinmore Abbotoirs near Brisbane is employing 70 foreign workers and will employ 200 more by the end of the year, as no Australian worker wants to do it.

There are places in this country, such as regional areas, where you will find an abundance of desperate unemployed poeple who would give anything for an opportunity like this, yet it goes overseas.

Any trade or skill can be learned in an Abbotiors in a relatively short amount of time. It is absolutely disgusting that we are looking overseas when we have the resources in our own backyard, with less effort and less expense.

We need to look within for solutions before we look elsewhere.

I will bring anyone personally to some Areas in Regional NSW where you have fit, strong skilled men with little opportunity. What about giving them a fair go?

We dont want temporary overseas demand pushing up the lower end of the rental market, making it even harder for those on the cusp.

We dont want segregated parts of society with ghettos of short term visitors who send the rewards of their labour overseas, not keep it in our economy.

Pathetic and disgusting. The government should step in, perhaps to provide incentives or restrict the overseas labour trade so there are little alternatives.

Wake up.

More to the point Realist, perhaps many the unemployed of rural and regional NSW wouldn't be unemployed if their abattoirs hadn't been closed in the first place. For small towns such as Aberdeen in the Hunter Valley, and Guyra on the Northern Tablelands, the meat industry was the main source of income. When the abattoirs closed these towns virtually shut down. Now apparently the abattoirs that stayed open, and presumably took on the extra work, can't find the staff. Of course, I'm sure the good people of Guyra who have lived in the town their entire life would be delighted to move to, say, Warwick.

What happed to all the unemployed Australians that the Federal Government was going to take a big stick to because they were not accepting certain jobs, not retraining and not relocating?

Judging from the fuss made, it seemed that there would be ample employees for Australia’s needs if people were made to work instead of staying on the dole out of fastidiousness or sloth, or lack of training.

With all these ‘slackers’ out there, there should have been no need to import, semi-secretly (how many people knew about it?) 30,000 foreigners, who will send most of their earnings out of the country, in the last seven months, but further increase the strain on our utilities and infrastructure.

“Sponsor companies have to pay overseas workers $39,000 a year”. Is this irrespective of the type of work they do? What would an Australian worker doing the same work be paid?

These workers can apply for permanent residency after 30 months, and most wish to become Australian citizens, according to the agent interviewed. It would be interesting to know if those staying are included in the immigrant numbers revealed to the public, and if there is further tinkering with immigration numbers we don’t know about.

The PM might be truthful in his aversion to ‘guest workers’ in a technical sense, be his less honest in his claims about getting Australians back to work and training.

The ‘457 visa’ is a pretty slippery way to avoid his obligations to Australians in the area of training and work opportunities. Described by ‘The Australian’ as importing “guest workers by stealth”, there is apparently no limit to the numbers of these workers who can be brought in each year.

PS

I wonder how hard it is to “prove” you can’t find suitable Australian workers.

I wonder about a lot of this stuff,1 hour a day makes you employed,people over 50 laid off as being to old,i,m 59 worked in the construction ind most of my life,my knees have given out I have rung jobs first thing they ask how old are you or date of birth,once thats answered it pretty much dont call us we will call you,they have a massive underemployment problem in OZ but like most of the figures released by the Govt unemployment, inflation, ect its just bull,besides this Govt dont know anything and if there is a possibilty they do blame someone else,anyone else never themselves.

Realist, the thing is that you can't force people to move to areas where there is employment. Abattoirs in WA have been loudly screaming for workers for 3 years now, advertising on radio, you name it they have tried it. Alot of people simply don't want to work in abattoirs and alot of people don't want to move to WA regional areas, where the work is. Trucking sheep across Australia is not a solution. Thats in fact what has been happening, but it
makes no economic sense, nor is it acceptable from an animal welfare perspective.

Contract workers from overseas are the only solution left, unless you can think of a way of solving the problems that I have mentioned

Whether or not you can force workers to move to areas where there is work we will never know. The Government recently talked tough about people who seemed to prefer the dole and other social welfare benefits to much of the work available. But, as usual, it was all talk and nothing has happened.

The fact remains that if people don't take on available jobs that don't fit their ideals, even if it does require relocation, and look for something better while they are at least getting an income, they will be regarded with suspicion. Most people would prefer work to the dole, but there are increasing numbers of people appearing on TV current affairs programs telling us how they are better off on the dole than working. And, they are getting away with it.

These people are helping the Howard Government to continue importing foreign, compliant and willing-to-do-anything workers. They could just as easily contribute to the cessation this sneaky practice.