On 7 May, the Migrant Justice Institute released their report based upon the largest-ever study of migrant working conditions. The team surveyed nearly 10,000 workers on temporary visas across Australia. The data reveals a dire system in which many employers systematically underpay migrants and evade the Fair Work Act, deploying many of the same tactics to avoid consequences.
The report, “Off the Books: Inside Australia’s hidden system of migrant exploitation”, reveals the extent and detail of migrant worker exploitation nationally, but importantly, it also provides a number of interventions to redress legal loopholes that employers are resorting to presently, and amendments to legislation that could enhance migrant worker protections.
Laurie Berg is the Co-Executive Director, Migrant Justice Institute, and Associate Professor, Faculty of Law at the University of Technology, Sydney.
She says, “We got 9963 participants. It’s a lot of people. Overwhelmingly, they were currently on temporary visas. The survey was open to anyone in Australia or overseas who had worked in Australia on a temporary visa.”
The easily navigable, interactive report reveals that two in three migrant employees are paid less than their legal minimum hourly rate; the rate of use of ABNs to engage migrants on visas is four times that of ABNs used to engage the general workforce (most were likely misclassified employees); 40 per cent of casual and ABN workers are paid below the National Minimum Wage; and...
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