Illegal migrant workers in Australia
‘What we are coming here for is, basically for money’. A new report, Exploited and illegal: Unlawful migrant workers in Australia, by Marie Segrave (professor of Criminology, Monash University) quotes this illegal migrant worker, who like most of the “50,000 to 100,000 non-citizens working unlawfully in Australia” were doing so “to financially support their families back in their home countries via remittances. [summary report at https://theconversation.com/what-its-like-to-live-and-work-illegally-in-australia-81478 ; full report at http://artsonline.monash.edu.au/thebordercrossingobservatory/research-agenda/trafficking-and-labour-exploitation/illegal-workers/ ]
Segrave interviewed four dozen illegal migrant workers, most of whom had come to Australia with the intention of working, despite having no legal right to work attached to their visa. They had either deliberately overstayed an expired visa or were working in breach of their current visa conditions.
All the migrants were working for very little pay, this wage exploitation “generated by their unlawful migration status” because to formally complain to government agencies would risk deportation - the illegal migrant workers regarded First World labour exploitation as still a cut above Third World exploitation.
Also of note is that compliance and detection efforts across Australia “are relatively ineffective at identifying and removing illegal workers”. Police, for example, do not probe on the legal status of temporary migrants they come into contact with (and why, indeed, would street cops risk angering the ‘anti-racism’ gods of Political Correctness).
Of interest, too, is that illegal migrant workers see refugee status as a ticket to permanent residence – shonky ‘migration agents’ in Australia can ask up to $400 for processing a ‘refugee’ protection visa based on “false information”. Any reason will do, including such guaranteed heart-string-tuggers as the applicant being gay and facing persecution if deported.
Segrave is from liberal academia, however, and duly sides with the illegals, arguing “we need to have a zero tolerance to exploitation, rather than a zero tolerance to breaches of visas by migrants”. From the material presented in the report, however, a hundred thousand illegal migrant worker jobs paid at First World wages to Australian citizens , would make a huge dent in Australia’s 700,000 (5.5%) unemployment rate. Australians taking back jobs held by legal migrants would also claw back a lot of the rest from the dole queue.