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Pacific Australia Labour Mobility scheme

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Pacific Islander seasonal worker in Australia

The Pacific Australia Labour Mobility scheme is a guest worker program that allows Australian businesses to hire temporary workers from Pacific island countries and Timor-Leste. The scheme allows participating workers to work in seasonal agricultural jobs for up to 9 months, or in longer-term jobs for between 1 and 4 years. The scheme was launched as the Pacific Seasonal Worker Pilot Scheme in 2008 and initially only permitted employment in Australia's agricultural sector, but has since expanded to other industries, including meat processing and aged care.

As of August 2024 over 30,000 workers were employed through the scheme, with about 90% employed in agriculture and meat processing. The Australian government has described the PALM scheme as a "triple win" that addresses labour shortages in Australia, provides well-paid employment to participating workers, and provides skill development and remittances to developing Pacific island nations. But the scheme has been criticised for facilitating worker exploitation and for its rate of worker deaths and injuries. In a 2024 report, the New South Wales Anti-Slavery Commissioner highlighted poor working conditions and practices of modern slavery facilitated by the scheme. The scheme has also been criticised for facilitating brain drain from Pacific island nations and for providing limited benefits to Pacific workers.

History

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The predecessor of the PALM scheme, the Pacific Seasonal Worker Pilot Scheme, began in 2008 as a pilot program to bring unskilled and low-skilled workers from Pacific island countries to work in the Australian agricultural sector.[1] The pilot program initially had low take-up from workers, which was attributed to a lack of awareness among employers and a lack of demand for additional agricultural labour due to an existing supply of backpackers employed in the sector on working holiday visas and widespread illegal employment in the sector.[2][3] But a final evaluation report gave a largely positive assessment of the pilot scheme, finding that despite its limited uptake, it had provided benefits to participants and had "met its domestic objective of assisting Australian employers in the horticulture industry with demonstrated unmet demand for labour".[4]

In December 2011, the government announced its intention to launch a full-fledged version of the scheme, the Seasonal Worker Program (SWP). The SWP was similar to the pilot scheme in most respects, but three new sectors — aquaculture, cotton and cane — were added, and the cap on the number of workers was expanded to 12,000 over a four year period.[2] In 2018, the Australian government launched the Pacific Labour Scheme (PLS), which allowed for longer-term employment than the seasonal agricultural work permitted under the SWP. In April 2022, the SWP and PLS were consolidated into the uncapped, demand-driven PALM scheme.[5][6]

The number of PALM workers in Australia grew significantly during the COVID-19 pandemic, during which many other populations of temporary workers were barred from entry to the country.[7] The number of participants grew from about 6,000 in 2019 to almost 35,000 towards the beginning of 2024.[8] But participation in the scheme fell by 24% between July 2023 and July 2024, in large part due to the return of other populations of temporary workers.[7] The decline has also been attributed to a set of 2024 reforms that require PALM scheme workers to be offered at least 30 hours of work per week, with agricultural employers arguing that this is overly onerous given fluctuations in their operations. The National Federation of Farmers has argued that these changes to visa rules have made it harder for agricultural employers to participate in the scheme.[9][10][11] In the lead up to the 2025 Australian federal election, the Coalition indicated that it was likely to roll back these minimum working hour reforms if elected.[12]

Operation

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PALM scheme workers by country of origin, August 2024[13]
Country of origin Number of workers
Fiji 5995
Vanuatu 5780
Solomon Islands 4820
Timor-Leste 3760
Tonga 3680
Samoa 2865
Papua New Guinea 1960
Kiribati 1605
Tuvalu 310
Nauru 35

Workers from 10 countries are eligible for the PALM scheme — Fiji, Kiribati, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, Solomon Islands, Timor-Leste, Tonga, Tuvalu and Vanuatu. Participants in the short-term stream can work in seasonal agricultural jobs for up to 9 months, while participants in the long-term stream can work in Australia for between 1 and 4 years.[14] As of August 2024, there were 30,805 PALM scheme workers in Australia, one third of whom were living in Queensland. 52% were working in farming, 39% were working in meat processing and 6% were working in accommodation and care.[13][1] PALM scheme workers make up 10% of Australia's agricultural workforce and 23% of its meat-packing workforce.[15] The scheme has 494 participating employers, of which 102 are labour hire companies.[16]

Many Pacific islanders are able to earn far more in Australia through participation in the PALM scheme than they would be able to earn in their home countries and often send remittances home to their families.[17][8] Long-term PALM scheme workers earned an average of $40,836 in 2020 and saved or remitted 39% of their income.[18] PALM scheme workers sent home a total of $184 million between 2018 and 2022, while Australian employers earned $289 million in direct profit from PALM workers.[8] Some Pacific island countries are highly reliant on these remittances; in 2022, Samoa ranked second in the world for remittances as a percentage of GDP at 33%.[19]

The Australian government has labelled the program a "triple win" that benefits Pacific island nations, participating workers, and Australian businesses.[19][5] Despite its beginnings in agricultural industries, the PALM scheme has been progressively expanded into new sectors beyond agriculture since its introduction, including meat processing, aged care, hospitality and retail.[20][8]

Beginning in 2023, concerns began to be raised that PALM workers had begun taking advantage of a backlog in asylum applications by absconding from their employers and lodging asylum applications that would allow them to live and work in Australia for several years on bridging visas until their applications were decided.[21][7][10] In the 2023–2024 financial year, asylum applications from the approximately 30,000 PALM workers in Australia reached 244 per month, a rate of about 3000 per year.[7] Professor Stephen Howes of the Development Policy Centre has labelled many of these applications "bogus", pointing out that asylum applications from PALM countries, with the exception of Papua New Guinea, are almost never granted.[22][23]

Debate

[edit]

One of the primary criticisms of the PALM scheme has been the inability for workers to change employers. Workers in the PALM scheme are typically tied to a single sponsoring employer, with limited ability to switch to a new employer.[8][16] Scholars and advocates have argued that this inability to change employers enables exploitation and makes it more difficult for workers to speak up about wage theft and poor working conditions.[24][13][25] As of April 2025, 7000 PALM scheme workers had absconded from their employers over the preceding five years.[16] Concerns regarding worker exploitation have been present since the earliest days of the scheme; the Australian Institute of Criminology published research into the potential for worker exploitation in the pilot scheme in 2011.[26] A 2024 report from the New South Wales Anti-Slavery Commissioner highlighted modern slavery risks associated with the scheme.[27][28] Several employers have been investigated or fined for underpaying or exploiting PALM scheme workers.[28][29][30]

The scheme has also been criticised for providing workers with less access to government programs and benefits than Australian residents. The Australia Institute has published research suggesting that PALM workers are often taxed at a higher rate than Australian residents and have limited access to their superannuation.[31] Some workers have been overcharged by their employers for services like accommodation and transport, and often have deductions made from their pay to cover the cost of their flights to Australia.[32][1] PALM workers do not have access to Medicare and must take out private health insurance,[15][1] and also face high remittance costs.[33] President of Timor-Leste José Ramos-Horta has criticised the overcharging of Timorese workers for accommodation and transport by PALM scheme employers.[34]

Pacific island leaders have expressed concerns that the scheme primarily benefits Australian businesses and that the benefits to Pacific island nations and workers are exaggerated. PALM workers in Australia make up 9% of the Tongan working age population, 5% of the working age population of Vanuatu, and 3.4% of the working age population of Samoa. This has led Pacific countries to express concerns about brain drain and the effects of the PALM scheme on their domestic economies.[15][35][19] Samoa, Tonga and Vanuatu have all commenced reviews of their participation in offshore labour mobility schemes as a result of these concerns.[35][36] Between 2018 and 2022, workers sent home $184 million in remittances, but paid $280 million in tax, rent, and day-to-day expenditures while in Australia.[8] The scheme has also been criticised for creating social problems in Pacific countries, including families being abandoned by spouses living in Australia.[37][36] In response to these concerns, the Australian government launched a pilot program in 2023 that would allow some PALM scheme workers to bring their families with them to Australia.[38][39]

The scheme has also received criticism for its rate of worker deaths and injuries. 29 PALM scheme participants died in the 2022–23 financial year and 233 critical incidents involving injuries to PALM scheme workers were recorded between 2020 and 2023. Between 2021 and 2023, between 10 and 14 participants died in boating and car accidents, 17 died due to medical conditions, and the cause of 17 additional deaths remained under investigation as of December 2023.[40][41] The rate of deaths among PALM scheme workers has been described as "staggering" by Abul Rizvi, former deputy secretary of the Department of Immigration.[9] In August 2024, representatives of the Fijian government announced plans to visit Australia to investigate working conditions after a Fijian woman died of a brain tumour while working at an Australian abattoir, with some former coworkers alleging that workers had faced restrictions around sick leave and access to healthcare.[42]

References

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  1. ^ a b c d Nishitani, Makiko (6 December 2024). "Australia's Pacific labour mobility scheme needs urgent reform". East Asia Forum. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  2. ^ a b Doyle, Jesse; Howes, Stephen. "Australia's Seasonal Worker Program: Demand-side Constraints and Suggested Reforms" (PDF). Development Policy Centre.
  3. ^ Bennett, James (18 February 2015). "Backpackers, illegal labour cruelling Seasonal Worker Program for islander countries: World Bank". ABC News. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  4. ^ "Final Evaluation of the Pacific Seasonal Worker Pilot Scheme" (PDF). TNS Social Research. September 2011. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  5. ^ a b "The Long-Term PALM Scheme: Triple Win During The COVID-19 Pandemic and Beyond" (Presentation). Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade. 2022. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  6. ^ "Seasonal Worker Programme and Pacific Labour Scheme". Australian Taxation Office. Retrieved 29 March 2025.
  7. ^ a b c d Wiseman, Don (20 November 2024). "Grave concerns for Pacific Australia Labour Mobility scheme". Radio New Zealand.
  8. ^ a b c d e f Withers, Matt (23 October 2024). "The Pacific Australia Labour Mobility scheme is helping some workers but harming others – it needs to be reformed". Lowy Interpreter. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  9. ^ a b Down, Rhiannon (14 January 2025). "Pacific worker scheme at 'low point', as agriculture worker numbers fall". The Australian. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  10. ^ a b Dowd, Rhiannon (2 January 2024). "Farmers grow tired of Pacific Islander worker visa scheme". The Australian. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  11. ^ Malcolm, Jess (5 June 2023). "Farmers threaten to boycott Pacific scheme". The Australian. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  12. ^ McKay, Ben (23 April 2025). "Coalition plans Pacific labour review, unclear on aid". National Indigenous Times. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  13. ^ a b c Withers, Matt (22 October 2024). "Promoted as a win-win, Australia's Pacific island guest worker scheme is putting those workers at risk". The Conversation. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  14. ^ "Pacific Australia Labour Mobility scheme". Department of Employment and Workplace Relations. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  15. ^ a b c Adhikari, Alexia; Anderson, Lilia; Harrison, Morgan (December 2023). "The PALM scheme: Labour rights for our Pacific partners" (PDF). Australia Institute. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  16. ^ a b c Amin, Mridula (27 April 2025). "'Scared' and 'helpless': Rayasi's dream of working in Australia was not what she envisioned". SBS. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  17. ^ Doan, Dung; Dornan, Matthew; Edwards, Ryan (17 November 2023). "The Gains and Pains of Working Away from Home the case of Pacific workers and their families" (PDF). World Bank. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  18. ^ Kanan, Lindy; Putt, Judy (October 2023). "Safety and wellbeing in Australia's Pacific labour mobility scheme Research report". ANU Department of Pacific Affairs Research Reports. doi:10.25911/B20G-M466.
  19. ^ a b c Gerber, Paula; Gosper, Sarah (8 May 2024). "The dark side of the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility scheme". Monash Lens. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  20. ^ Marie, Johanna (23 May 2024). "Pacific workers move from farms to service stations in expansion of Pacific Australia Labour Mobility scheme". ABC News. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  21. ^ Kelly, Cait (22 July 2023). "Pacific Islander workers making as little as $200 a week in Australia seek protection visas for better pay". The Guardian. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  22. ^ Howes, Stephen (6 November 2024). "Pacific PALM workers applying for asylum in record numbers". DevPolicy Blog. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  23. ^ Howes, Stephen (4 February 2022). "Absconding for asylum: Pacific temporary workers in Australia". DevPolicy Blog. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  24. ^ Withers, Matt; Kagan, Sophia (21 November 2024). "Free agency is a right, not an option". Lowy Interpreter. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  25. ^ Ferguson, Adele (11 October 2024). "Australia's PALM working visa scheme is a 'modern day slavery risk', advocates say. The system needs to change — and fast". ABC News. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  26. ^ Ball, Rochelle; Beecroft, Laura; Lindley, Jade (November 2011). "Australia's Pacific Seasonal Worker Pilot Scheme: Managing vulnerabilities to exploitation" (PDF). Trends & Issues in Crime and Criminal Justice. 432. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  27. ^ "Be Our Guests: Addressing urgent modern slavery risks for temporary migrant workers in rural and regional New South Wales" (PDF). Office of the New South Wales Anti-Slavery Commissioner. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  28. ^ a b Ferguson, Adele (23 September 2024). "Modern slavery report uncovers dark side to PALM visa scheme leaving vulnerable workers homeless and destitute". ABC News. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  29. ^ Sparkes, David (13 January 2016). "Labour-hire company faces court over allegations of exploiting Pacific island workers in 416 Visa program". ABC News. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  30. ^ Marchant, Gabriela; Mantesso, Sean (19 July 2024). "Ni-Vanuatu women unite to overcome seasonal work 'nightmare' with court case against alleged sexual abuse". ABC News. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  31. ^ Killen, Gemma; Hawking, Tom; Richardson, David (September 2024). "PALM visas, superannuation and tax" (PDF). Australia Institute. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  32. ^ Bailey, Rochelle (1 October 2019). "Limiting possible exploitation in transportation services for seasonal workers". DevPolicy Blog. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  33. ^ Collins, Jessica (8 October 2023). "Reducing remittance costs in the Pacific Islands". Lowy Interpreter. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  34. ^ Dziedzic, Stephen (9 October 2024). "Timor-Leste president slams exploitation in Australia's PALM scheme, cites excessive living costs". ABC News. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  35. ^ a b Bedford, Charlotte (8 August 2023). "Pacific labour mobility over the last year: continued growth". DevPolicy Blog. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  36. ^ a b "Vanuatu launches action plan to address worker shortage and social problems caused by labour mobility schemes". ABC News. 25 November 2024. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  37. ^ Faa, Marian (2 July 2023). "Pacific women and children 'abandoned' by husbands working in Australia under PALM scheme". ABC News. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  38. ^ Voloder, Dubravka (18 May 2023). "Australia's PALM scheme has big changes on the horizon. Here's what you need to know". ABC News. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  39. ^ Whetham, Bec (9 January 2023). "'A lot of excitement' for foreign workers set to be joined by families under visa scheme". ABC News. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  40. ^ Hodge, Hugo (21 December 2023). "PALM worker deaths increase fourfold amid expanding scheme and increasing reliance on participants". ABC News. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
  41. ^ Hodge, Hugo (16 October 2024). "At least 64 Pacific seasonal workers have died in four years. Their families are often left empty-handed". ABC News. Retrieved 3 May 2025.
  42. ^ Miles, Daniel (20 August 2024). "Fijian government to meet Australian PALM workers following tragic death of Christine Lewailagi". ABC News. Retrieved 21 December 2024.
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