Immigration Amendment Bill (No 2)

Can I start this first contribution that I am making in Parliament for the year 2015 by wishing everyone a happy New Year, in whichever culture and ethnicity they choose to celebrate that New Year. For all of us this is a new beginning. Sadly, for this Government, with this Immigration Amendment Bill (No 2) nothing has changed, because despite some very good and well-considered submissions to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee on this issue, the Government, again, has failed to listen. The speech that I began in 2014 on this issue had been interrupted by a glorious summer but, none the less, the thing that remains is the Government’s failure to actually listen to people who do take the time to come and make very serious submissions on things that the Government gets wrong in its legislation, and in this legislation it has far too many things wrong.

This was a piece of legislation that the Labour Party supported at its first reading, because it is fundamentally important to the New Zealand Labour Party that all workers are protected from exploitation. It is fundamental to the roots of the New Zealand Labour Party that we stand up for workers’ rights—workers of all persuasions. This bill purports to actually defend and strengthen the rights of migrant workers, to stop them from being exploited in their workplace. That is a very serious issue because, of all the workers in the New Zealand workplace, migrant workers are some of the most vulnerable. They are some of the most vulnerable because they depend often on the sponsorship of their employer—the very person who may be exploiting them—for their right to be in New Zealand. So their vulnerability is significantly higher than many other workers in New Zealand workplaces. But the Government has again failed to recognise the power relationship when it has tried to address their exploitation through this bill.

One of the main reasons that the Labour Party cannot support this bill, even though some of the measures in it are very, very good, is that the Government simply refuses to understand that migrant workers need additional protection. They need additional protection in order to make sure that their rights at work are safeguarded. In particular, the Government imagines in writing this bill that migrant workers will be able to go and report their exploitation at work to Immigration New Zealand.

Thinking about migrant workers and their relationship with Immigration New Zealand and the failure of this bill to protect those workers from deportation, I think most thinking New Zealanders will understand that this bill purports to do something but will achieve nothing because most of those workers will be too fearful in the first instance to be criticising their employer, who has, in many cases, sponsored them to be in New Zealand. Secondly, they will feel a little frightened to be reporting that to Immigration New Zealand—the very organisation that has the power to deport them. This bill has failed to protect workers in that instance.

For those reasons and because the Government has failed to properly fund the people who should be monitoring this issue in workplaces—those are the labour inspectors from, well, we used to call it the Department of Labour; whatever the “Mobie” thing is called these days—for the Government’s failure in that direction, and because it has failed to make sure that the most fundamental issues are protected for some of the most vulnerable workers in New Zealand workplaces, Labour, sadly, cannot support and is opposing this bill.

I am surprised and disappointed to hear from the honourable member Sue Moroney that the Labour Party will not support this bill. There are so many great provisions in it that will protect exploited workers.

When we talk about the prosperity of people who live in New Zealand, that includes our migrants. It includes people who come here because they come to follow the dream of a better way of life. It is a terrible thing when people come to this place with dreams and hopes and they are exploited in such a way that they cannot fulfil their ambitions. I do know of many migrants who come here, work very hard, and do find a great future here. It is great to know and note that, particularly in my time when I lived in Auckland and also in Taranaki. We see that, and it is great to see.

One of the aspects of how this not only undermines the aspirations and rights of people for a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s labour but also undermines other good, compliant, law-abiding businesses that do pay everything that is required of them by the law. It gives these people who would seek to exploit their workers and pay less, if at all, and be able to tender for work or do jobs at a cut-price level—those companies that pay a proper wage, that pay tax, that pay GST, and that have health and safety provisions and pay for it are at an economic disadvantage. It is important, if we are going to have a society that is prosperous and safe, and where people can earn a good wage, that we put an end to some of this behaviour. It is also important that we acknowledge that we want to see improvements right across the spectrum of the New Zealand workforce, and we want to see wages grow so that there are situations where people can improve their way of life.

There are many provisions, as the member Sue Moroney was saying, about people who might be reluctant to come forward. I can understand that. There are, no doubt, lots of people who support them, but in this bill there is also provision to create a safe haven for them, so that if they come forward to Immigration New Zealand, immigration officers will disregard any previous breach of the work-related conditions of that applicant’s current visa, if they have cooperated with Immigration New Zealand and its labour inspectorate by providing evidence of workplace exploitation. It is a hard thing to be able to administer, but we have got to do it. We have got to ensure that we create an even playing field and the opportunity for people to succeed and get the reward for their hard effort. Thank you.

The Labour Party and other Opposition parties had, I know, extremely high hopes for this legislation. We recognise, as the Government appears to recognise as well, that migrant workers are amongst some of the most vulnerable workers in our country. I agree with the previous contributor, Mr Young, when he said that there are many migrant workers who come to New Zealand and who make a good fist of what is on offer here. In my electorate in Palmerston North, the university and the hospital, in particular, attract a lot of migrant workers—skilled migrant professionals—who settle in our city and make a very good life for themselves.

We also have a number of students who come to study at one of our fine tertiary institutions in Palmerston North, and they may seek to pick up a bit of work. They often try to pick up seasonal work, particularly in the horticulture industry. Those workers and other migrant workers in those industries tend to be those who are the most vulnerable. They find themselves locked into employment situations that are not acceptable, that are not appropriate, and that are in breach of the law, but they are also locked into a very intimate relationship with the person who employs them on those contracts, because, as other speakers have said, often the only reason they are in the country is because of the sponsorship of that person who is employing them. So they feel utterly beholden to them.

I have worked on behalf of migrant workers—and I am sure many electorate members of Parliament have done this—who have found themselves on the wrong side of Immigration New Zealand because their employer has dobbed them in about something, because they have somehow or other got offside with their employer, often over the terms and conditions of their employment. So this is a serious issue. We are glad to see that the Government has attempted to do something about it, but, sadly, and with a considerable amount of regret, we cannot support this legislation because it simply does not do the job. It actually leaves migrant workers just as vulnerable as they were before. We absolutely agree with increasing the penalties on those employers who exploit migrant workers. We absolutely agree that those people should feel the full force of the law and that the penalties should be severe for exploiting migrant workers. But the truth is that it will be very, very difficult to gather the evidence that exploitation is occurring because it is still an extraordinarily daunting thing for those most vulnerable workers to come forward and actually speak up about the exploitative practices that they have been subjected to.

It certainly does not help that we have this idea of warrantless searches. Where have we heard that before? It seems to be a favourite of this Government, the idea of warrantless searches. So labour inspectors charging on to a worksite with warrantless searches is going to strike fear into the hearts of these working people. They are not the target of those searches. We know that—members opposite know that; we know that on this side—but the workers are unlikely to understand that. They are going to be in absolute fear that those labour inspectors are going to be coming in to find reasons to send them back to their home country, not to deal with the exploitation.

Mr Young tried to sort of suggest that there are safeguards in place and that migrant workers can come forward and have absolutely rock solid evidence of the exploitation, perhaps something written down, something on paper—I do not know. Maybe they would have to record something—

💬 Sue Moroney: An admission from the employer, maybe.

Maybe the employer could come forward and turn themselves in. But the truth is that of course workers are going to feel that if they do not have a strong enough case, if they have not gone and done the work that the labour inspectorate should be doing to gather the evidence to make sure that they are in a safe position, they are likely to be on the receiving end of the sanctions that are laid out by Immigration New Zealand, not only instead of but as well as the employer.

This bill has not done the job, and that is because this Government did not listen when people came to the select committee and told it what was wrong with the bill. That is supposed to be the point of our parliamentary process—if you have not quite got it right at the first draft, you take it to the select committee and you listen to the people who are going to be affected by this legislation. You listen to the people who are in the situations that you are trying to fix and you make your legislation work so that it will actually do the job. But, instead, what have we got? Window dressing. We have got window dressing from a Government that wants to look like it is doing the right thing but is actually not prepared to put the resources in to properly fix the situation. In fact, if this legislation was perfect, it probably in itself still would not fix the problem. Having legislation is one thing; what you need to be able to do is enforce it. There is no point in having any laws unless we have got the police, the Serious Fraud Office, the labour inspectorate—all manner of regulatory authorities that are there—properly resourced to actually enforce the law. The truth is we have neither the labour inspectors nor the immigration inspectors to properly enforce this legislation.

I understand that the labour inspectorate has actually been directed to prioritise cases involving migrant workers. That is great. That is fantastic. Obviously, this is a sensitive issue for the Government. There has been too much bad press and it wants the inspectorate to do something about it. But there are so few labour inspectors and they are so under-resourced that in order to prioritise cases involving migrant workers they are having to turn down perfectly good cases from ordinary New Zealand workers, who are also vulnerable. I hope the Government actually understands that. People who are on zero-hour contracts are vulnerable. People who have employers who are unscrupulous and try to keep them in employment agreements that do not entirely adhere to the law are vulnerable.

We have laws in place that say that you have got to pay at least the minimum wage and you cannot deduct wages from people. Tell that to the people who had their pay cut because somebody stole from their supermarket or from their petrol station. Was it the labour inspectorate that sorted that out? No, it was the media.

💬 Brett Hudson: What’s that got to do with migrant workers? What’s that got to do with immigration?

What has it got to do with migrant workers? We are talking about vulnerable workers. Migrant workers—

💬 Brett Hudson: No, we’re talking about immigrants, I believe.

He says migrant workers are not vulnerable workers. That is what that member over there said. I cannot even remember his name. He said that migrant workers are not vulnerable workers. Well, I suggest you read this bill—that would be a good start—and you actually go back to your caucus room and talk about what the purpose of this bill is, if you think that migrant workers are not vulnerable workers. The man whose name I cannot even remember seems to not understand what this bill is about. I wonder whether he is speaking on it later on.

Migrant workers are vulnerable workers and they share a lot of interests with other vulnerable workers around the country. But this Government cannot even make sure that people born in New Zealand have security at work. It cannot even ensure that the labour inspectorate can enforce the laws that apply to people born in New Zealand. How is it going to make sure that the laws that apply to migrant workers are going to be enforced? It cannot. It cannot do it. That is why this legislation, flawed as it is—even if it was absolutely perfect, even if they had bothered to listen to the people who came to the select committee, even if it was perfect—still would not do the job, because that party that is in Government right now is not prepared to provide the resources that are required to actually protect vulnerable workers.

I do say that it is with regret that we oppose this bill because we agree that it is an issue that is pressing and needs to be sorted out. But this Government did not listen. It has got it wrong. We do oppose this legislation.

Thank you for this opportunity to speak in support of this bill, the Immigration Amendment Bill (No 2). I do so for two reasons. The first reason we are reading this bill is because it is cracking down on migrant exploitation. It may not be perfect—it may not be perfect—but it is a couple of big steps in the right direction. Ironically, many of the employers who are exploiting migrant workers are themselves migrants, or have been. This bill allows these people who hold residency class visas to be deported. That is the first reason I support this bill.

The second reason is because there is currently an inconsistency in the way we treat the perpetrators of the exploitation of migrants. It all depends on the victim at the moment. So if the victim is unlawful here, then the perpetrator will be treated differently than if the person was lawful here. This amendment bill tidies all that up. It treats people equally under the law—one law for all—unlike what I have heard from the Labour leader recently when he proposed different laws for different groups of people depending on their ethnicity.

That is why I support this bill in this short call—for the tidying up and creation of a fairer and more consistent law regarding the punishment of people who are willing to exploit, unfortunately, migrant workers. Thank you.

It is with a degree of frustration and disappointment that I rise to take this call and inform this House that the Green Party can no longer support this bill, as we did at its first reading. Like the Labour Party and the Government, we agree there is a problem in this country with the exploitation of migrant workers. In November 2013, when this bill was introduced to the House, we shared in this House quite a few stories of the exploitation of workers. We know that this is a very significant problem in this country, where workers are being told they will be fired unless they work for nothing. Over the weekends they are being kept almost as slaves in some situations, in slum accommodations, and have outrageous rent being deducted from their wages for those accommodations. People are being paid well below the minimum wage and they are trapped in that situation. So there was a dire need for this legislation; there really was.

As has already been mentioned on the National Party side, this legislation is important for the protection of those workers, but it is also important for the protection of our economy and the assurance that there will be a level playing field for businesses in New Zealand, because those businesses that are upholding the minimum standards, which are not really that high in this country, of protection of workers should not be competing with other businesses that are not keeping to those minimum standards. They are at a disadvantage in that scenario. We need legislation to rectify that. So we were keen on going into the select committee process to find out what we could do to make sure that this legislation addressed that need.

We spoke to, and worked very closely with, the union of migrant workers to check with it, through the progress of this legislation, as to whether we should be supporting this bill. Sadly—sadly—through all of that process we find ourselves in a situation where we are unable to support this legislation. Although it does penalise employers and puts a cost on breaking the laws, which is very good and very important, it does not provide the protection for workers to be able to come forward and report the exploitation. If it was just the fact that it was putting on penalties and did not have negative aspects to it, we would probably support it. But also hidden in this bill are a lot of unrelated measures that are pernicious and that actually breach what I consider are basic standards of law and good legislation. The issues were raised by the Legislation Advisory Committee, which advised against what this bill is doing. I would like to run through some of those things.

We had a message from submitters that as most people in this situation of being exploited are on temporary visas, to enable people to come forward and report abuse, you need to guarantee them the protection of their visa for a period so as to enable them to look for another job if they lose that job, because, otherwise, reporting risks them being sent home. They will lose that job probably because that employer with these penalties will no longer be in a position to employ them. So you have to ensure that they have a job and the protection to be able to stay here and to be able to come forward. The Government adamantly refused to offer that. So there is no commitment to actually enable people to come forward.

Secondly, what this does is it provides the Immigration Service, not the Labour Group, with powers of search into private residential properties without a search warrant. This is the country that has a very bleak history of dawn raids and a very real memory within vulnerable communities in this country of having being targeted by the Immigration Service. This bill introduces extended powers of search into residential properties by the Immigration Service not the Labour Group. Surely, if your focus was on protecting employment rights, you would have given those powers or considered those powers for the Labour Group, not the Immigration Service. When we raised those questions through the select committee process we were told that that was a policy decision. There was no answer for why it was being given to the Immigration Service, bar the fact that it was a policy decision. Basically, that is this Government’s agenda. Who knows what is behind that. Honestly, if I was in that community, I would be worried, because a lot of communities do feel vulnerable in relation to the Immigration Service. If we care about the protection of vulnerable workers, we need to be enforcing and strengthening our labour systems.

Another aspect of this bill that is not being talked about so much, and it is not really related to the protection of vulnerable workers at all, is a very, very strange provision that will enable the Immigration Service to deport people who have residency if somebody has found something in their visa application that was incorrect. They do not even have to have known it was incorrect themselves. It does not have to have been a lie. But if somebody finds something in their original application that was incorrect, even if it does not relate to the reason they were granted their visa, this bill enables those people to be deported. That is extraordinary. We were strongly advised to remove that by immigration practitioners, the Legislation Advisory Committee, and the New Zealand Law Society. Basically, it creates a strict liability provision and removes the causal link that enables deportation at the moment, where the false information is related to the reason that their visa was given. Already we have a law that enables somebody to be deported if they lied or provided false information and that led to them being given a visa.

What this says is that anything in their entire application, if they got it wrong—even if they did not know they had it wrong—has no relevance to the granting of their visa, and if they have been here for 9 years, the Government can deport them. That is extraordinary—absolutely extraordinary. We asked the officials why we cannot change this. It is because there is the ability for somebody, if the decision has been made, to be able to appeal to the Minister of Immigration to challenge that decision on all sorts of grounds. When we ask why this is in there, we were given no reason. There has not been an increase in false information in people’s applications. The officials really struggled to give even one example of where this has happened. They did give one that did not seem particularly worrying to anyone on the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee, and we were all just, basically, a bit bewildered about what on earth this was about.

At the suggestion of the committee chair, and with the support of other committee members, I wrote to the Minister and asked that the Minister might want to reconsider this. Firstly, there does not seem to be any reason for it. Secondly, we had been given strong advice that it is not a good idea. And, thirdly, it has got the potential to increase bureaucracy and burden on an already overwhelmed system, if false information has been identified and then somebody appeals and it goes to the Minister or it goes to the tribunal. Those systems are completely overwhelmed already and now this is adding another level of burden on to those stretched systems for something that we have not even been given a case for. But the Minister’s response was that he was not interested. So it really is beyond me what on earth that is about in this bill.

Also, we were advised against the fact that this creates a levy that the Legislation Advisory Committee suggested we change because it is basically kind of setting up a tax system. There is no direct identification around what that levy is going to be used for, which is typically good legislation. If you are going to levy something that is not just a general tax, then you identify very specifically what you are wanting to use it for, and it does not do that. So it is kind of setting up an alternative tax system within our immigration system to fund services that are overwhelmed, and this is going to overwhelm them even more because the Government has not funded them properly. So it has very little to do with the very urgent problem of protecting our migrant workers. It is distressing not to be able to support it.

I rise on behalf of New Zealand First to speak against this amendment bill, the Immigration Amendment Bill (No 2), but before I start things off I would like to wish you all a very warm and festive season for 2015. I am sure everybody is excited to be back in the House with their legs under the table, as I am.

We have given this bill some serious consideration and a lot of discussion, and we think that what has been said today—albeit it in opposition—is on the right track by opposing this legislation. We feel that the bigger picture has not been really brought to the forefront of the minds of New Zealanders. I think what we need to really get across here is the importance of looking after New Zealand jobs for New Zealanders first and foremost. That is not saying that we do not have issues within our system currently. As recently as last year, I personally was involved in a situation where we had immigrant workers in the lovely Bay of Plenty, in Tauranga, working on kiwifruit orchards. The issue came about because in fact the workers themselves were working for immigrants, and they had been exploited to the worst possible level that I could ever imagine or hope to ever see.

New Zealand First spoke up about this and got to the bottom of what was going on. The crux of the matter was that these people were brought out from Fiji. They had had to sell their cars. They had had to mortgage their small properties that they had in order to get enough money together to get an agency—which was, of course, based here in New Zealand—to force them over here to give them the world as far as First World wages, accommodation, and great working conditions are concerned. Of course, when they arrived in this fabulous country, the land of milk and honey, none of that was there for them. They were left with no other choice. They were stranded in New Zealand. They had been here for 6 weeks and had earned themselves $160 working full-time on these orchards, working for other immigrants who had themselves come out to New Zealand, which I find absolutely disgusting. However, these people had no choice. They were stuck in New Zealand, and it was only by New Zealand First’s intervention that we actually got these people sent back home, from New Zealand.

We have to stop this, but the cure is actually in the prevention and not in these actions, not in this puffery and the fluffery that have been put forward here that this is going to be the cure. This is not going to be the panacea that will fix this immigration problem for our migrant workers. We have to have far more stringent controls on our borders. We have to do far more for the people of New Zealand. We have to look after our people first before we start looking at immigrant and migrant labour for all of the jobs. Currently, as we will all be aware, because it has been touched on earlier on today in several speeches that we have heard, we have 138,000 temporary migrant workers in this country. We have another 100,000 people on student visas who have got extended rights to be able to work in this country, taking away precious jobs from those Kiwis who need them the most. We are not against student visas. We are not against those people coming out to study in our country, because that is good for our economy and that is good for our schools and our universities. But we are against the fact that these jobs are being soaked up and taken away from the people who are the most vulnerable unemployed workers whom we call our New Zealand citizens.

We have got 54,000 people on working holiday visas per annum coming through the country at the moment, and there are yet another 143,000 currently unemployed. These are unemployed people with zero hours of work, and yet there are far more—estimated at some 230,000 people—who have actually got only part-time work who are not considered to be unemployed in this country.

We have got some serious issues, and they go back some time. If I cast back to a story that was broken by TV3 in November of 2013, it was said here that “The Immigration Department is ‘a visa stamping factory’ trying desperately to make up for the number of Kiwis who are leaving, parliament has been told.” Winston Peters spoke up and said that 20 percent of all of these visas that had been stamped had been reported to be unfairly stamped, and under conditions that would not be usual. We are forcing people into this country and we should be spending more time, more money, and more effort on looking after our borders and tightening up those controls.

As early as today in the Dominion Post we had an article written—and you will all be aware of that—about our local New Zealand workers whose jobs have been taken up by immigrant labour coming over from South Africa and India and taking up those media positions for the Cricket World Cup. This I cannot get my head around. If we are a nationalistic country, looking for the best outcome for New Zealand, we should be putting everything in our power into looking after these people who live in this country. I understand absolutely implicitly, and I have sympathy for, and understanding of, the comments that have been made by Iain Lees-Galloway and by members of the Green Party this afternoon. They are vulnerable workers. There are vulnerable migrant workers out there who need our support and help, but if we actually put resource and effort into the areas that need it the most, then that is going to be more beneficial, and that is at our borders.

When I talk about the Bills Digest—I read through that this afternoon—we have got great words here like “Biometric information”, “Exploitation of migrant workers” and cracking down on this, and “Electronic notifications”. It goes on to talk in great length and detail about “Decisions made using absolute discretion” and about “Deportation where information fraudulent, forged, false misleading or concealed” can actually force these migrant labour workers out of our country. But there is only one line here—one line—that talks about border security. Security at our border is the most important thing. I have spent 25 years in hospitality, and there is a saying that has gone around for many, many years that if you can control your room by controlling the people who come into it, you are not going to have the problems that you are going to have later on. That is by having good security measures at your front door to ensure that you have the right people doing the right thing. We oppose this bill. Thank you.

It is great to see everyone back in the House after the long summer break. It is nice to be in the House. It is my pleasure to speak in support of the Immigration Amendment Bill (No 2). New Zealand, of course, is a land of immigrants, whether it occurred 1,100 years ago or for those people who arrived in New Zealand yesterday. We welcome the diversity that migrants offer, and, of course, New Zealand benefits from all the skills and cultures that they bring to us here in New Zealand. We recognise that New Zealand was founded on a bicultural relationship, but we are, of course, a multicultural society. In my own electorate, in Hunua, we have had many immigrants. We have had a lot of people of Chinese and Indian origin, and we welcome the contribution that they have made to growing a prosperous Hunua electorate. But in all societies there are unscrupulous employers and people, and this bill is about protecting immigrants from exploitation.

There is currently a gap in New Zealand where employers who exploit unlawful workers can face heavy sanctions, but those who exploit lawful migrant workers face low penalties. This bill is about dealing with that inequity. The penalties are significant for these unscrupulous employers—and rightly so.

We also want to encourage victims to feel that they can come forward and talk about areas where they are being subjected to poor conditions, without the threat of being penalised. I was interested in what Miss Logie said. Contrary to what she did say, this bill is actually about providing the opportunity for immigration officers to disregard any previous breach of work-related conditions of an applicant’s current visa if he or she has cooperated with New Zealand or a labour inspectorate by providing evidence of workplace exploitation. That is what this bill is about: making an environment where people feel that they can come forward and be open without the threat of being removed from the country. We need to create that environment. In essence, this bill is to ensure that migrants enjoy the same working conditions as all New Zealand workers. Not only is this bill good business but it is fair, it is appropriate, and it is just. Thank you.

I understand the next call is a split call. Denise Roche—5 minutes.

I rise to take a short call on the Immigration Amendment Bill (No 2), and I join my colleagues on this side of the House in opposing this bill’s passage through the House. There is no doubt that the stated intention of the bill is worthy. It is meant to introduce measures to address the exploitation of migrant workers, and there is no doubt that we definitely need to do this. However, on balance and after careful consideration of the evidence and the advice, the Greens cannot support this bill, because we do not believe that this bill will stop the exploitation of migrant workers.

We agree with some submitters, like the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions, who advocate for better employment conditions across the board and an employment relations legislative framework that enables migrant workers, and all workers for that matter, to challenge bad employment practice without fear. However, the laws that this Government has introduced—laws like the ability to fire workers at will during their first 90 days on the job, and, more recently, the legislation that was passed at the end of last year that reduces workers’ access to a trade union or to bargain collectively—have placed all workers in greater insecurity than ever before. On top of this, many migrant workers fear deportation if they speak up about being ripped off, because the employer who is ripping them off holds all the cards because the temporary work visa is attached to that job and that employer, and in many cases those employers have sponsored that worker to come to this country in the first place. So the employment relationship is far more intense and far more tipped in the balance of the employer than in normal employment relationships.

In the submission from the Union Network of Migrants, which is the union network for migrant workers, it advocates for a broader application of an open work visa so that in the case of worker exploitation, the worker can be assured of some security while their case is investigated. And we note that this issue has not been resolved during the select committee process. The union also outlines how the bill could be strengthened to ensure that employers who do exploit migrant workers are brought to justice by removing what they call the corporate veil. Basically, that is where an employer is caught exploiting workers—you know, breaching minimum employment standards in New Zealand law—and essentially they just wind themselves up, so they are unable to pay any penalties or, in fact, frequently back-pay the workers what they are owed. So what the union suggests is that the law be extended, as it is being extended under the current Health and Safety Reform Bill that is in front of the House, so that the responsibility for all employment standards breaches includes officers or persons conducting a business or undertaking—what it is calling “PCBUs” under the health and safety legislation.

We note the recommendations from other submitters that more emphasis should be placed on enforcement so that there is a deterrent for employers against them exploiting their employees, and we do not see a lot of that happening currently. I understand from the submissions and the research that there are only about 40 labour inspectors in the country at the moment and they are under-resourced, and have only just got to the tip of the iceberg of the many, many cases of exploitation that are happening in this country. We reject the idea in this bill that Immigration Service officers be given extended enforcement powers, because it mixes up the rights of the worker with the immigration issue completely and adds another layer of fear on top of what those exploited workers are already feeling. We are greatly disappointed in this bill. It does not set out what we thought it might do, and it is very disappointing. Thank you.

Carmel Sepuloni—5 minutes.

This is the first time I have been able to stand in the House and speak in 2015, so can I start by just saying happy New Year to you, Mr Assistant Speaker, and happy New Year to all of my parliamentary colleagues across the House.

Labour initially supported this bill to the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee and, clearly, we support the intent of the bill, which is, in our mind, caring for vulnerable workers. However, following submissions it has become very apparent that the bill will not significantly tackle migrant exploitation, and there are several issues with the bill that have been pointed out today by my Labour colleagues, by Green Party colleagues, and also by former colleagues who are no longer in the House.

Changes to immigration law to increase penalties for employers who exploit migrant workers will be ineffective without a significant boost to enforcement resources. The No. 1 concern is that we can legislate, but if the resourcing is not in place in terms of the labour inspectors, then who will be monitoring what is going on? As the Green MP before me, Denise Roche, said, there are currently only approximately 40 labour inspectors operating across the country. That will do little to assist us with looking after and monitoring our vulnerable workers, including our new migrant workers. We in this House all know—and we from all sides of the House are all very aware of this—that migrant worker exploitation is growing in New Zealand. We have seen it highlighted by reports in recent years of Christchurch workers not being paid for holidays and annual leave and not being on employment agreements. We know that the law will still depend on migrant workers coming forward. As many of my parliamentary colleagues have said today, that is a highly risky proposition for a worker new to New Zealand, whose visa status often depends on their job.

There are often other barriers, such as English language barriers, that hinder their inability to come forward, and, of course, there is that imbalanced power relationship between that employee and the employer, which could influence whether or not they come forward with any of their concerns. Even with added protections, it is particularly difficult for migrant workers to put their jobs on the line and hope that they will be able to find other work. I am really concerned about the extended powers of search by the Immigration Service—not the Labour Group but the Immigration Service.

As one of my parliamentary colleagues said earlier, we cannot help but hark back to the dawn raids in the 1970s and be reminded of that—the fear that was struck into new migrants, many of them Pacific Islanders at the time. We know that that same fear could be inflicted on new migrant groups now if they have immigration inspectors entering their private residences to undertake extended searches. So if we are talking here about protecting migrant workers, then I fail to understand how intimidating them and going into their private residences and provoking fear amongst them is going to in any way assist us with protecting them in the workplace. Far too many migrant workers in New Zealand have their employment rights abused, which not only harms our migrant communities but also undermines the wages and conditions of all workers in New Zealand. When considering the Immigration Amendment Bill (No 2) it is important to remember National’s shameful scaremongering about boat people during debate on the first immigration bill, the Immigration Amendment Bill. I am not sure whether anyone has brought that up but I think it is worth reminding us all in the House of that.

It is good to see the Government, with this bill, putting some thought into assisting migrant workers. However, the changes proposed still fail to address the core issues. We need to create an environment to enable workers to report abuse. Workers are not going to report exploitation if they risk being deported. The failure to provide visa protection for those on temporary visas undermines the entire intent of the bill. The Government also continues to fail to employ enough labour inspectors, as I said earlier, to reduce the pressure on migrant workers to report. That is probably one of the major failings with the bill we have in front of us.

The absolute discretion clause to make decisions without giving reasons is liable to abuse, particularly with clause 8, which makes it clear that the Privacy Act does not apply to reasons for decisions made using absolute discretion. That is concerning.

I am going to wind up by just saying that we did support the intent of this bill but we cannot support what we have in front of us right now.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker, for allowing me to take this very short call on the Immigration Amendment Bill (No 2). Like the rest of my colleagues, this is the first time I have spoken this year so I would like to wish them all a very happy New Year.

I am pleased that the Opposition agrees with the thrust of this bill. It is extremely important to prevent and to deal to the exploitation of immigrant workers. In Southland we are enjoying an unemployment rate of 3.2 percent at the moment and we are heavily reliant on immigrant workers. In fact, if it were not for immigrants our population would be going backwards. So it is extremely important for us to have this legislation in place and to protect their rights.

Despite what the Opposition says I think it is extremely important that the immigration officers’ powers are extended so that they can go into employers’ places of work, and search, and seize information to form a case against these employers who are exploiting these vulnerable people. So I have no hesitation in supporting this bill.

When the Minister of Immigration, Mr Woodhouse, started to speak about this bill, I actually had high hopes for what the Government was going to do. I have been here long enough—I should not have been so naive.

I have here the Minister’s first statement on the legislation, made in June 2013. He said there would be new measures to combat migrant exploitation—he was going to make it unlawful. Exploitative behaviour would not be tolerated, and the Government would crack down on unscrupulous employers. I thought this was really good. I thought: “At last the Government is going to do something about a problem that every member of this House knows has existed for some time.”

I know a problem exists because in my electorate of Mt Roskill we have a high migrant population, and when you read the media stories about exploitation, sadly, a lot of those people are living in my electorate. I thought that at last the Government was going to act, and the Opposition, when this bill was introduced, reflected that optimism—we supported the bill. We went to the select committee with the intention of further strengthening it, getting it right, and making a difference, in order to stop the appalling abuse of human beings that happens too often, particularly when a migrant worker is here on a temporary visa. They need the job and they are reluctant to speak out because they know that if they speak out they will be sacked, and if they lose their job they will lose their right to be here. Everything works against them. But at last the Government was going to act.

Unfortunately, when we went through the process of examining this bill, we found that the reality was quite different from the perception that the Minister was trying to portray. For a start, this bill is not predominantly about stopping the exploitation of migrant workers. This bill is predominantly about making it easier for the Government to deport the people it wants to deport. Secondly, it is about raiding the migrant levy to pay for things in infrastructure that tax would normally be required to pay for.

I want to talk on both aspects of what is wrong with this bill. For a start, the bill will be more symbolic than real, for a number of different reasons. Firstly, there is a lack of resources to detect exploitation—and I am going to come back to that. Secondly, there is a misplaced role on the part of Immigration New Zealand. They are the ones who are working on the exploited labour. But, actually, if you want migrant workers to come forward, if you want them to speak out, often they will not come to the agency whose role it is to strictly enforce the provisions of their visa. They are going to be frightened of Immigration New Zealand. If you had an enforcement role, surely you would put that in the hands of the labour inspectorate, whose role it is to stop exploitation. That would have been the logical thing to do. Thirdly, there is too little protection for migrant workers when they do speak out. I want to address each of those areas, but I want to come back to the question of the migrant levy.

The migrant levy was imposed, supposedly, to help migrants settle in New Zealand more quickly and more easily. God knows there is a need for resources to be applied in this area for people to pick up fluency in the English language—it is absolutely critical. You have to have fluency in the English language to be part of your wider community. Secondly, the migrant levy was imposed to help migrants get a job. The critical issue that members of my ethnic communities talk to me about when they first arrive in New Zealand is getting on the first rung of the ladder to finding a job. There is so much more that could be done with the migrant levy to help people do that. Thirdly, creating a harmonious community is about helping new migrants to understand the culture and the customs that exist in New Zealand. So there is a huge demand on the migrant levy.

This Government is going to double the migrant levy. But is it going to double the migrant levy in this legislation to help people settle more readily? No, it got caught out in this bill. And who did it get caught out by? The Legislation Advisory Committee, chaired by Sir Grant Hammond. He said that the current migrant levy is for the sole purpose of research into migration and to help with settlement, and he said that it is not a tax. But he said that this new immigration levy is simply a tax. It is going to fund immigration infrastructure that is normally paid for out of general revenue. So here is this Government, which talks so much about looking after ethnic communities, doubling the amount of money that it is ripping off the migrants coming in, not to spend on helping them to settle but to pay for the normal bureaucracy of the Immigration New Zealand division. That is dishonest, and it got caught out by the Legislation Advisory Committee. These are not my words—that this is a tax—these are Sir Grant Hammond’s words. He does not have a political axe to grind, but he knows a scam when he sees one, and this has got scam written all over it.

Now I want to come to the question of exploitation. You know, it is hard to believe that the Government really is concerned about the appalling exploitation that is happening. Why? Well, the first thing is that every piece of employment legislation that has come before this House has been designed to remove protections. It has taken away the statutory right to a lunch break and to smoko breaks. It has made it harder for the unions to gain access to the workplace. How can the unions find out about exploitation when those employers who are unscrupulous are not going to allow them into the workplace? And it has absolutely undermined collective bargaining, and collective bargaining is the way in which people who are working honestly in the workforce can protect their rights. So not only has the Government taken away these protections from migrants but it has also taken them away from all New Zealanders. That is the first thing.

The second thing is that if you want to stop exploitation, you need to detect it. How do you detect it? Well, the International Labour Organization says that having a labour inspectorate is the way to do it and that in an advanced country like New Zealand there should be one labour inspector per 10,000 workers—one per 10,000 workers. Do you know what the actual ratio of the labour inspectorate to workers is in New Zealand, Mr Hudson? Do you know? It is not 1:10,000; it is 1:56,000. We do not come anywhere near the international standards for protecting our workforce against exploitation. Even with the Aussies it is 1:19,000. The Aussies are three times better off than we are. So if the Government really wants to stop exploitation by the unscrupulous employer—not the majority of employers but the unscrupulous employer—then surely it would strengthen the labour inspectorate. There is nothing in this bill—nothing in the declared intentions of the Government—to address that problem.

The third area is the one that I talked about before. If you genuinely want to give migrant workers the chance to come forward, make it easy for them. Do not make them go to the agency that is there to enforce visa conditions; let them go to the labour inspectorate.

There is something else that could be done. Some years ago I was involved with a piece of legislation called the Protected Disclosures Act. It was quite good for its time. Now it needs modernising, updating, and strengthening. It needs to apply as strongly in the private sector as it does in the public sector. There is nothing here for that. When I go through the litany of cases about people being exploited, I see what we fought against, or our forebears fought against, in the late 19th century and early 20th century. I see people who pay their employers for the privilege of working, because having a job is a condition of their visa to be in New Zealand. I see cases of people being paid $2 an hour or $5 an hour. I am not making this up. These are case studies that have been published. That exploitation is getting worse as our migrant population increases and as our student population with work visas increases. It is a disgrace in New Zealand to see that sort of exploitation. What we need is a real effort, not the window dressing that this bill represents.

Thank you, Mr Assistant Speaker—

💬 Hon Member: Oh, it speaks.

It does, indeed. I would just like to just wish you, Mr Assistant Speaker, and my parliamentary colleagues around the House a happy New Year. It is great to be back and to speak on this Immigration Amendment Bill (No 2). If you are looking to change behaviours in a workplace or in an environment, you do not do it by trying to create more regulators and more workforce to look at what has gone wrong. You change people’s behaviours. This is a key part of this bill.

So what do we do? When you are talking about a power imbalance, what do you do? You punish the perpetrators, not the victims. So what does this bill do? It says that, unfortunately, so many of the people who exploit migrant workers are migrants themselves. So what power does this bill give? It gives the power to deport those exploiters of migrant workers, if the exploiters have been resident for fewer than 10 years. So what do you have? You have the exploited worker, who is suddenly in a position of greater power. If they complain, they are not the ones who will be leaving New Zealand. It is their employer who is going to be thrown out. If you are trying to change behaviour, you address the source of the problem; you do not address the victim. That is what this bill is doing. I commend it to the House. Thank you.

The question was put that the amendments recommended by the Transport and Industrial Relations Committee by majority be agreed to.