Fruit picking jobs for local aborigines or guest workers from the Pacific?

Growers' struggles to get fruit and vegetables picked and processed have led the Australian Farmers’ Federation to campaign to bring in ‘guest workers’ from the Pacific Islands and East Timor to Australia. There are not enough backpackers on youth visas to meet their needs.

Fruit and vegetables are grown in every state and territory. Growers face severe labour shortages at harvest time. Queensland growers from the border to the Atherton Tableland have joined the chorus for ‘guest workers’ But what about unemployed Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders? About two thirds of Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders are not living in mainstream society, and of these more than 80% are on welfare. Many are actually living in fruit and vegetable producing areas. For others, a stint of fruit picking away from home is one of the few ways into the labour force. They could earn substantial incomes. They would not have to travel the thousands of miles guest workers would have to come from the Pacific Islands. The costs of employing these Australians would therefore be far lower than a guest worker scheme. It would make an enormous difference to welfare dependent Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander communities if their young men and women began to find their way into jobs. Overstaying, inevitably associated with short term immigration, would be avoided.

In an early 2005 trial, 11 out of 16 Aborigines from Cape York picked fruit in Victoria at the same rate as back packers for three months until the crop was harvested. Yet such trials have not been followed up.

Three obstacles would have to be removed to get Aborigines harvesting fruit.

Firstly, the rules that require Newstart (unemployment) recipients to take available jobs would have to be applied in the localities where picking jobs are available. This is at present not being done.

Secondly, transport, accommodation and mentoring would, at least initially, have to be lined for workers from remote communities. Such support would, of course, also be necessary for Pacific guest workers. Indeed, bringing villagers from the Solomon Islands or Papua New Guinea to move up the Queensland coast with the picking season would entail far greater efforts and costs than helping Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders to do so.

Thirdly, labour market organisations that are already funded to get Aborigines into jobs would have to meet their obligations. Until mid-2008, CDEP (Commonwealth Development Employment Project) ‘sit-down’ money on top of unemployment and other welfare payments made picking fruit unattractive even if it was only a stone’s throw away. Most CDEP organisations were, in any case, unwilling to follow up to the Cape York initiative. They were afraid that they would lose CDEP participants and funding. Where CDEP has not been abandoned, or where it has been reinstated, it continues to be a strong deterrent to entry into real jobs. For example, a pumpkin grower on the Ord River and a grape grower near Alice Springs could not find Aboriginal pickers although both farms were located near Aboriginal settlements. There have been hundreds of similar cases in Queensland.

Most Job Network and other labour market organisations funded to get Aborigines into jobs earn easy money coaching them for interviews and preparing their ‘resumes’ for non-existent jobs. Only an exceptional few have been willing to make the serious efforts necessary to get their clients into fruit picking jobs locally, let alone away from home. Until here are penalties for neglected employment opportunities, taxpayers will continue to fund non existent services.

Fruit and vegetables have to be picked when they are ripe. Farmers must have hard working and reliable pickers. Backpackers, mostly venturesome, educated youngsters travelling for a gap year before pursuing further studies, perform well and earn good incomes. But so would many Aborigines. Some have demonstrated that they would require little help to meet farmers’ needs. Others would require support to overcome the years of isolation from mainstream society that has made them fearful of real jobs and inured them to the deprivation of half-lives on welfare. But with support, and provided slacking or absenteeism were not tolerated for Aborigines (or any other welfare recipients) by a return to undiminished welfare, work habits would evolve.

Because of the years of neglecting Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders, even so simple a program as fruit picking has become a major challenge. But fruit picking is one of the few job entry opportunities for poorly educated Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders. It would be a suitable transition from welfare to work. Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders are highly mobile. They travel constantly to visit relatives and friends, to go shopping and simply to relieve the tedium of their existence on welfare. They could return to their communities for some months of the year.

Enabling unemployed Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders to earn money fruit picking is surely not beyond Australia’s capacity. The alternative is to condemn them to languishing on welfare in increasingly dysfunctional communities. Making use of workers already in Australia would be far better policy than ignoring them in favour of unskilled guest workers from overseas.

Emeritus Professor Helen Hughes is a senior fellow at the Centre of Independent Studies