Australia's governments are coordinating an unarmed invasion without your permission

Thank you for allowing me to comment here. I am preaching to the choir but will go ahead anyway. I think these things are often more widely exposed in newspaper blogs, where political advisors go to measure the public mood.

Anyway, what has stunned me this week is that more than one hundred Australian bureaucrats used polluting jet aircraft to join the 15,000 other jet-setting climate change agitators in Copenhagen. The hypocrisy of this floors me.

There we have an onslaught of self-righteous panic-stricken who want to dictate to the rest of the world how each country manages its assets, its people, its economic structures. Anyone who democratically presents an alternative viewpoint is disparagingly dismissed as a climate change denier. Recently I heard Malcolm Fraser referring to Australians who don't approve of illegals attempting to queue-jump their entry into Australia as "red-necks".

These attempts to bludgeon alternative opinion into oblivion serve as reminders that power, in the wrong hands, can reap havoc.

As a milder example, the unfortunate global panic about the Y2K bug isn't far behind us.

The shocking absence of any Copenhagen debate ... on the likelihood that non-harmful population control could contain global warming to an increase of no more than 2 degrees, tells me that all national leaderships are so short on brains that they should be totally ignored until such work is undertaken.

The shocking absence of any Copenhagen debate, or advertised scientific assessment on the likelihood that non-harmful population control could contain global warming to an increase of no more than 2 degrees, tells me that all national leaderships are so short on brains that they should be totally ignored until such work is undertaken.

An even worse scenario for Australia, is the mad idea by one K. Rudd that there can be a S.E. Asia Union, where Australia with its population of 22 million would become a population dumping ground for the larger nations around us.

An even worse scenario for Australia, is the mad idea by one K. Rudd that there can be a S.E. Asia Union, where Australia with its population of 22 million would become a population dumping ground for the larger nations around us. Is this idea more to do with K.Rudd's ego, and ambitions to be Secretary General of his S.E. Asia Union just in case his application for Secretary-General of the UN falls over?

And on the United Nations, beware Australia. The push by the UN to impose a global order on countries that are doing quite nicely without the dramas and hatreds of foreign teeming hordes, is looming larger every day. Let's hope that the current Australian government doesn't sacrifice Australia's autonomy under the veil of self-congratulatory political expedience. We are seeing this every single day, in one form or another, under K. Rudd's subtle iron fist. But not so subtle really, because there are some who see right through agendas sooner than others.

Can someone please tell me what the projections would be if all nations were successfully encouraged to reduce their populations, and by what amount, by 2060, in order to curb over-demand on resources, thereby cutting carbon emissions to an environmentally safe level?

Would it be true to suggest that population control (and given the science on the lifetime eco-footprints of domestically confined animals, a similar reduction in their numbers) should be a first and soundly affordable first step?

I don't think that we can advocate human population control, without acknowledging the need for concomitant domestic animal control. The domestic animal industry is an equal contributor to environmental pollution. Whether or not we humans love and need to lean on companion animals should not exclude this side of a legitimate debate.

I am not calling for austerity control measures, but it seems to me that the measures being proposed by the Australian government and others, are overly complex, replacing common sense for confusion and international stress.

If anyone has any science or modelling on the levels to which curtailment of human and domestic animal populations would likely reduce the pollution that is causing so much Copenhagen hysteria, then I would love to read about it here.

--and that this is becoming the norm -- but the article fails to note that this is a major reason that business groups lobby the government so hard to keep importing immigrants.

The article concedes a number of points that ought to be arguments against high immigration, yet fails to connect the dots. These points include:

1. "At least two-thirds of migrant workers are exploited with regards to their pay and conditions," Ms Kearney said.

2. "If an employer can access a temporary worker, employ them for half the minimum wage, exploit them to the degree we are seeing, that has to have an impact on the local employment market."

3. It also impacts other workers, forced to compete against those willing to work for less than the minimum wage — which is $22.13 for a casual worker.

4. Such practices place downward pressure on wage growth.

5. "Low wages in Australia has been a big issue over the past five years," economist Callam Pickering said.

6. "It has actively undermined household spending, keeping it at record low levels.

7. "Bringing people into the country, paying them below minimum wage, is not a recipe for economic success."

The ABC article also fails to note that the practice of underpaying immigrant workers, once it becomes the norm, is part of the point of claims that businesses “can’t get Australians to work for them”— which is usually true only in the rather dishonest sense that there is no point in employing an Australian when you can get an immigrant to work for illegally low wages. (And indeed an employer that used Australian workers might go out of business because their wage bill would be far higher than their competitors.)

Instead, if anything, the ABC article implies that reducing visa restrictions would stop employers exploiting immigrant workers, and then everything would be lovely.

Biased reporting is not just reporting that distorts the facts. It is also reporting that fails to join the dots, or that joins them selectively in one direction, and not in others.

Below is the original article:

Blackmail — the business plan for cheaper wages

By business reporter David Chau 23 Nov 2017

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-11-23/blackmail-business-plan-cheaper-wages/9177498

Underpaying migrant workers has become a business practice for unscrupulous employers.

For some employers, it is an easy way to boost the bottom line with a low risk of getting caught — hence there is little incentive to comply with industrial laws.

It has even been described as a "business model" by worker advocates.

"There are employers out there structuring the cost of doing business through stealing wages," said Ged Kearney, president of the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU).

"They use very exploitable migrant workers, and use the sickle of [the workers'] temporary visa status to enforce that."

Out of the 900,000 temporary migrants in Australia with work rights, those in the 457 visa category are a particularly vulnerable group — as many are hoping to attain permanent residency.

Getting away with wage theft

The ABC was able to interview Ben, a Sydney-based technician who is on a 457 visa (and who wanted to use a pseudonym instead of his real name).

Unfortunately, he is working for an employer who commits wage theft by routinely blackmailing him.

However, Ben chose not to complain to the authorities because the employer also regularly threatens to "get him fired" and "deported".

"My boss deposits [my salary of] $1,500 into my account each fortnight, then I have to withdraw $500 from an ATM to give back to him," he said.

"I was never in a position to refuse — otherwise, he wouldn't offer me the 457 visa."
Ben is ultimately forced to survive on $500 per week in Sydney, the city with the most expensive real estate in Australia.

Explained: The 457 visa

http://www.abc.net.au/cm/lb/8027378/data/457-visas-custom-data.jpg

What is a 457 visa and how many people have them?

But he is worried about the consequences of getting sacked before he attains permanent residency.

Under Australian immigration laws, 457 visa holders are allowed to remain in the country for only 60 days from the date their employment ends.

"If I get fired, I have two months to find a new job — otherwise I'll have to leave the country," Ben said.

"The immigration department told me I just have to find another employer." . . .

Exploitation affects the economy

"At least two-thirds of migrant workers are exploited with regards to their pay and conditions," Ms Kearney said.

"If an employer can access a temporary worker, employ them for half the minimum wage, exploit them to the degree we are seeing, that has to have an impact on the local employment market."

It also impacts other workers, forced to compete against those willing to work for less than the minimum wage — which is $22.13 for a casual worker.

Such practices place downward pressure on wage growth.

"Low wages in Australia has been a big issue over the past five years," economist Callam Pickering said.

"It has actively undermined household spending, keeping it at record low levels.

Why the 457 visa is going

http://www.abc.net.au/cm/lb/8451776/data/457-custom-image-data.jpg

After two decades and tens of thousands of visas, the 457 visa category has been abolished. But what was it and why does this matter?

"It has also kept inflation low [and] forced interest rates to their lowest levels in history."

The 7-Eleven scandal was just one recent example of a business, which systematically exploited migrant workers.
One in three migrant workers, who identified as backpackers and international students, are paid about half the minimum wage, according to research released this week by the University of New South Wales and UTS.
The study also showed most foreign workers are fully aware they are being exploited.

In addition, it found restaurants, cafes and farms — which employ fruit pickers — were workplaces which had some of the worst levels of underpayment.

"Visa workers represent 18 per cent of all the requests for assistance we receive," Fair Work Ombudsman Natalie James said.

"Given they are only about 6 per cent of the labour market, that does tell you they're over-represented in the cohort of people who aren't being paid correctly in the workforce."

Tougher penalties for employers

Ms James said the visa status of migrant workers, who complain to the Fair Work Ombudsman's office, will not be jeopardised.

"We can work with the Department of Immigration to ensure your visa is not affected because you've taken action to enforce your rights under the law to be paid your minimum wages."

In September, the Federal Government introduced the Fair Work Amendment (Protecting Vulnerable Workers) Act which increases penalties for employers' serious breaches of industrial law.

7-Eleven investigation

http://www.abc.net.au/cm/lb/6745470/data/7-11-custom-data.jpg

· 7-Eleven playing 'statistical tricks' in worker compensation scheme

· 'He made me scared': 7-Eleven worker speaks of intimidation

· Exploitation integral to 7-Eleven business model: insider

· 7-Eleven staff work twice as long at half pay rate

· 7-Eleven business model rips off workers, former ACCC boss says

· Convenience store empire 'built on something not much different from slavery'

"Now if a corporation rips off a visa worker and we can prove it was deliberate and systematic, that corporation will be up for over $630,000 potentially per breach," Ms James said.

"If you don't want to proceed, you will have that choice. But if you do, we can work with the Department of Immigration to ensure your visa is not affected because you've taken action to enforce your rights under the law to be paid your minimum wages.
But that is provided the employer is caught, and successfully prosecuted.

"Ultimately, low wages and cutting those wages undermines the success of the Australian economy," Mr Pickering said.

"Bringing people into the country, paying them below minimum wage, is not a recipe for economic success."
Becoming a permanent resident in Australia is the key to Ben's future.

As for why it matters to him, Ben explained: "It would give me the freedom to choose... to go back home by choice, and not because I'm forced."

If all goes well, he may also win the freedom to choose an employer who is willing to pay a fair wage — for a fair day's work.