There are immigrant issues all over the world to consider, as the same debate takes shape here in the United States. In Australia, like so many contries the world over, the issue of immigrants 'fitting in' to a new society is the hot topic of discussion. 1,100 people were arrested in raids at work sites around the U.S. in recent weeks. There have also been demonstrations across the U.S. this past week that continues to keep the issue out in the public discourse. Here is a piece from the land below. An immigration story that many of us may not be aware of. We thank a special correspondent, a professor at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, for this contribution.

Guest worker scheme may be better Pacific solution for both Australia and region

By Hamish McDonald Asia-Pacific Editor
April 22, 2006

ALREADY accused of dragging workplace relations back into the 19th century, it's understandable that John Howard may not want to go down as the prime minister who reintroduced "black-birding" to the Australian labor market.

But there's an element of willful blindness to history and geography in the Howard Government's refusal to give the idea of a seasonal guest labor scheme from the South Pacific more than perfunctory study and instant dismissal.

The scenes from Honiara this week emphasize the dangers to government in the region from young populations with high unemployment rates, sending idle young men into the towns ready to jump onto any excitement being stirred up.
The governments in the Pacific Islands have been urging Canberra to begin a guest labor scheme that would allow unskilled workers to come to Australia for a few months each year in jobs like fruit picking.

Ironically, as researchers Nic Maclellan and Peter Mares note in a study for Melbourne's Swinburne University of Technology, some ni-Vanuatu descendants of the original "blackbirds" - the thousands of Melanesians brought to the Queensland canefields as indentured labor between 1863 and 1904 - see a guest labor scheme as part of Australia's "restitution".

Howard's response at last October's Pacific Islands Forum in Port Moresby was simply to say this was not the way Australia handled migration, which was based on permanent settlement.

Yet in submissions from all over Australia to a current Senate Employment Committee inquiry, fruit and vegetable growers are begging for a trial, pointing out that produce is being spoiled and expansion plans shelved for lack of workers to pick and process. "Few resident Australians are willing to perform this type of work," said the Riverland Development Corporation.

It's also apparent, from many submissions, that seasonal farm work such as fruit-picking is now being carried out anyway by a kind of guest worker - the young "backpackers" from rich countries given 12-month working holiday visas.

This was not the scheme's intention, as applicants have to show the means to support themselves whether or not they get jobs, but it has now become a component of our farm workforce. The Immigration Department has tacitly recognized this, by allowing these holidaymakers to extend their visa for a second year if they do seasonal work for three months. Meanwhile, its officials raid farms and orchards to deport Third Worlders working illegally.

This is skewed opportunity. Australia might provide only a few thousand seasonal jobs, but this would make a significant difference to prosperity and skills in the Pacific Islands.

Currently our billion-dollar aid budget for the Pacific tends to benefit ourselves directly. The experts we employ are mostly Australian and other ex-pats, and the majority of professionals we help train in some island countries end up working here or in other advanced economies.
The couple of thousand dollars taken home by an unskilled fruit picker would feed back into better housing, education, health and small enterprises in his Pacific village, which rarely gets formal sector employment.

The impact may be relatively small for the largest country, Papua New Guinea, with a 5 million population, but noticeable in the other Pacific countries, whose combined population is only 2 million. As many of the Polynesian or Micronesian states enjoy migratory rights to New Zealand or the US, it would be best for Australia to focus on Melanesia.

Howard and his ministers, together with a strange ally - Bill Shorten, of the Australian Workers Union - raise the potential problems: over-stayers, the employers or labor exchanges who try to cheat, who pays for the travel and recruitment costs, the tax threshold, the pension and safety questions.

Yet Maclellan and Mares cite the successful scheme run by Canada for seasonal workers from Mexico and the Caribbean, which has limited visa-jumping by selecting workers with a obvious stake at home and offering the incentive of return working stints. Australian horticulture regions already have labor contractors qualified to handle the paperwork.

The Pacific Islands Forum secretary-general, Greg Urwin, has also pointed out that unlike our usual migrants, many islanders would be content with work visits rather than permanent settlement, given that they share in land ownership, extended family groups, and have traditional status in their societies.

Blackbirding was an ugly business, but perhaps the ugliest part was sending most of the islanders back home, whether they were settled in Queensland or not. A new guest labor scheme might be a modest way of making amends, building human ties between Australian farming communities and Pacific islands, and spreading opportunity to villagers on the fringes of normal economic development.



On a VERY different note......



Here is something to think about and that will give you a few laughs.

Guess which group this is! I am not going to offer a prize, but this is a hell of a survey.


Can you imagine working for a company that has a little more than 500 employees and has the following statistics?

36 have been accused of spousal abuse
7 have been arrested for fraud
19 have been accused of writing bad checks
117 have directly or indirectly bankrupted at least 2 businesses
3 have done time for assault
71, repeat 71 cannot get a credit card due to bad credit
14 have been arrested on drug-related charges
8 have been arrested for shoplifting
21 currently are defendants in lawsuits. and
84 have been arrested for drunk driving in the last year
Can you guess which organization this is?
No, it's Not the NBA! Ha!


Give up yet? . . . Scroll down, citizen!

It's the 535 members of the United States Congress.

The same group of Idiots, some would say, that crank out hundreds of new laws each year designed to keep the rest of us in line.


-Source Congressional Record 2005


Have a great weekend to everyone around the globe. Thanks for logging in and checking in.

See you back here, same time, same station.