Grave concerns for Pacific Australia Labour Mobility scheme

There are grave concerns for the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) scheme, with numbers down dramatically and thousands claiming asylum.

Under PALM, workers are brought in from Pacific Island nations and East Timor for short-term seasonal work in agriculture and horticulture for terms of up to nine months, and longer-term positions of up to four years.

The Australian Development Policy Centre at the Australian National University has been involved in advising on the schemes and assessing their merit.

Its director, Professor Stephen Howes, spoke with Don Wiseman who began by asking if PALM was in trouble.

Stephen Howes: It is in trouble. I think on the workers side, the number of workers actually being employed under the scheme is declining or has declined over the last year. And that's especially the case in agriculture, where we see a decline in the seasonal work programme that's part of PALM. It's a large decline of 24% from July 2023 to July 2024.

Don Wiseman: Is that due to the return of backpackers?

SH: Yeah. I think there are a number of factors, but definitely return of the backpackers is one big one. Nearly all the backpackers left during the pandemic. So there had to be a lot of reliance on PALM workers. The backpackers have come back in record numbers. There's still an incentive for them to work on farms, because by doing that, they can get a second and then a third year visa. And also the whole backpacker programme is a much less or, in fact, an unregulated scheme, whereas the PALM scheme is highly regulated.

DW: Is it too highly regulated?

SH: Well, that's the big debate, and there'll always need to be some degree of regulation, because it's a key feature of the PALM programme that your visa is tied to your employer. You're not allowed to change jobs, just to find a new job yourself. So that does give the employer a lot of power, and that will always require regulation. Where exactly the right balance is is hard to say. Government has been tightening the regulations. There has been a backlash from employers, and the government hasn't gone as far as it said it would. So I think that's a difficult question to say whether it's too highly regulated. But I think it is fair to say that with the backpackers back, and with that unregulated alternative, employers have to some extent shifted away from PALM back to the backpacker programme.

DW: I imagine also the farmers and the horticulturalists have been trimming back, because the Australian economy has gone into a bit of a dive, hasn't it, like most countries have in the last short while.

SH: Well, I don't think that. I think the sector's still doing pretty well as a whole. So I don't think it's an economy wide thing. The government has introduced these minimum hours requirements. Now you've got to ensure that your PALM workers get 120 hours over four weeks. So average of 30 hours or 30 hours averaged over four weeks. That does incentivise employers to be more conservative in how they deploy PALM workers, so I think that in particular, has led to a reduction in demand.

But the other problem with the scheme that I point to is that a lot of workers are leaving the programme. And that is a problem in itself, obviously, but it also discourages employers, because it creates a big headache for employers, and it undermines the reputation of the PALM programme as a programme that delivers you reliable workers, because if there's risk they're going to leave, then they're not as reliable.

DW: So when we talk about leaving, we're talking about absconding?

SH: Well, there are two related ways to leave. One is where you abscond. As I said, your visa is actually tied to an employer, so you're not allowed just to get up and move but, but some workers are. And then the other phenomenon that we've noticed recently, that you know might surprise your listeners, but it has become a definite feature of the programme, is that a large number of the Pacific workers are applying for asylum, and now that's meant to be if you've got a fear of persecution back home and most of the Pacific countries are democracies, they're pretty peaceful place, so by and large, these are unfounded claims. But what's happened in Australia is that this has become a problem well beyond PALM. We've got a large number of temporary workers and visitors claiming asylum, and the whole system's got clogged up, so that even if your application is eventually going to be rejected. It takes three or four years for that final rejection to actually occur, and in the meantime, you're on a bridging visa, and you've actually got unrestricted work rights, so you can change employers. You can work wherever you want. You can work in a city, whereas PALM is a regional programme, and you get Medicare Access. So it looks like the workers are leaving their employers because they're being badly treated. But in fact, it can be in the interest, or at least seem to be in the interests of the individual worker, to actually make this claim for asylum.

DW: So if they apply for asylum, they automatically get a bridging visa, and this entitles them to medical care?

SH: It's slightly more complicated than that. If they apply for asylum and they leave their employer, or their employment contract comes to an end, they're meant to return home, then they'll get a bridging visa. You get a bridging visa when your current visa is no longer valid. So they'll either get the bridging visa immediately, or they could get it later when their contract comes to an end.

DW: How many people would fall into this category?

SH: It is a large number, and actually, the Department of Home Affairs has just released data on it. So it's a problem that started off just before COVID and accelerated during COVID. So in 2020/21, on average, there were 53 asylum applicants per month from PALM workers. But by 23/24 that 53 had increased to 244 a month, which is almost 3000 a year. So you know, bearing in mind, there are about 30,000 PALM workers in the country at any point of time. It's a very significant ratio.

DW: There has been work done on assessing whether or not people are happy in these jobs, and some information has come out saying that there are unacceptable levels of work exploitation, but generally people are finding that the workers are very satisfied with the situations they find themselves in. So what's your organisation's experience?

SH: Yeah, that's right. I think because so many people are leaving, then observers, reporters, analysts, tend to draw the conclusion, well, they must be leaving because they're being badly treated. But in fact, as I said, if you actually look at the way the asylum process works, it can be a very rational decision to claim asylum, even if you are making a bogus application. And when you actually ask workers how they feel about the scheme, how they think they're being treated, the actual feedback you get is very positive. So with the World Bank, we did a survey in 2022 of 1400 PALM workers. And for example, 98% of the workers said they would recommend the scheme to their friends. And when you ask them to rate the scheme and rate their experience, on a scale of one to 10, the average rating that we got back was 8.5. So that's not to say, you know, in a large programme, of course, some workers are being badly treated, but I don't think exploitation is widespread. It is a very tightly regulated scheme. You've got to be approved to enter the scheme, and then your licence can be withdrawn at any time you're very closely monitored. So I don't think exploitation is widespread, but this problem of absconding and claiming asylum is definitely giving the scheme a very bad name. It's undermining its social licence, and it's something the government really needs to address.

DW: What do you do to fix PALM?

SH: Well, with this problem of claiming asylum, you know, the solution is actually very simple, which is just, you've got to reduce that processing time, because the great majority of these applications for asylum are, in the end, rejected. If the applicants know that it's going to be rejected in a matter of months, rather than a matter of years, then it just reduces that incentive to apply. And to its credit, the government has started to put increased resources into the review process, and it's also actually prioritized PALM worker applications, so those applications are being processed particularly quickly. So I think the government's going in the right direction. It's just a lot more resources are needed, because when we look at the total applying for asylum, whether it's Australia wide or just within PALM we don't see a huge reduction yet. And when we look at the processing times, especially at the review stage, they're still pretty long. So I'd say the government's on the right track, but it needs to put in even more resources, significantly more resources, to bring it down that processing time. And you know, it sounds expensive, but it should just be a temporary impost, because, once workers are discouraged, then number applications will go down. You won't need that that high level of resources. So we should treat this as a temporary problem requiring urgent action. But it really does need addressing, because it is destroying the reputation of the scheme, both among employers, but also more broadly in the general public.