By Mataeliga Pio Sioa
The former Cabinet Minister in charge of the seasonal workers scheme to New Zealand and Australia is not easily convinced by complaints in recent weeks by Samoan workers of being underpaid and exploited.
Satupaitea MP, Lautafi Mr. Selafi Purcell, knows the scheme ‘inside out’ after two consecutive terms as Minister in charge.
He and his island counterparts as well and New Zealand and Australia went over the design of the scheme that included provisions to safeguard workers from the kind of abuse now complained about.
Benefits were already starting to flow in as the unemployed and even the employed lined up by the hundreds at the early stages, to fill up the waiting list for the next recruitment call mostly for work in New Zealand.
Lautafi lost his Ministerial placing last year with the change of Government but while the scheme was already building new homes and getting families the luxury of buying cars, he was under no illusion to the burden of labour workers faced.
“The Seasonal Workers Scheme is not a holiday camp,” he stated bluntly when asked by Newsline Samoa to comment on the controversy making headlines in Australia for Samoan workers.
“Our workers have never been exposed to the kind of labour or regulated hours of work involved because they’ve never worked before and it can be a shock for many when the reality of hard work settles in,” the former Minister continued.
Lautafi believes that the complaints are coming from only a few, most likely those struggling to adjust the work, and is worried it could have an effect on the majority of the others.
His anxiety level is on the rise at the direct involvement of labour workers unions in Australia that some of the Samoan scheme workers have joined and of the brewing controversy.
Australia’s mainstream print media The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald carried a racially inflammatory headline story of Samoan workers coming under direct instructions from Samoa to quit ‘white people’ unions. (see other story)
“When this scheme was being put into place there were avenues already set up to address this problem with workers taking their complaints of unfair treatment or abuse, directly to the liaison officer whose job is to investigate and raise them with the farmers.
“If unresolved it then moves up to the Office of the High Commissions and then higher – this is a Government to Government scheme and all the channels are there to address these issues and find solutions.”
What Lautafi strongly rejects about the workers union involvement is when the point is reached where farmers do not want anything to do with the unions anymore and decided to pull out of the scheme.
He felt it is Samoa that will suffer the most with the loss of job opportunities for the unemployed local force.
But the former Minister did not fully discount the complaints by the workers as invalid in the belief that where there is smoke there is bound to be fire.
“There are several factors to look into, firstly the scheme has expanded very quickly in Australia, and it is possible that the new farmers who have joined in are guilty as alleged but they have to be checked out.
“Australia is a big country that cannot be compared to New Zealand, and people travel longer distances so these things and more have to be checked out.
“Some of the farms require long hours of daily travel to and from where the workers are living and these have to be factored into actual working hours.
Lautafi felt other Governments in the scheme should do the same for their workers with similar protests of abuse of contract to fix up whatever or wherever the real problems lie.
He added passing concerns too at relatives in New Zealand giving the workers wrong advice like encouraging them to join workers unions.
“In the first place our workers know little about unions, secondly they have to pay union membership fees regularly and that is an expense they are better off spending on families in Samoa.”
The Ministry of Commerce Industry and Labour is already taking steps to give scheme workers the needed support with the hire of an extra liaison officer in Australia.
The added staff sits well with Lautafi as the kind of support the workers must have within easy reach when they want it especially at the rate of growth the new recruitment has jumped.
He believed the workers head count is getting bigger and maybe too big already for two liaison officers to handle so three would be more comfortable.
“When you do the cost-benefit-analysis on the scheme it’ll show the employment opportunities are spread widely out to the villages and is humming along fine for us and the overwhelming majority of the workers.
“We have seen the good it has done already and the benefits to many of the families around Samoa, we don’t what all that jeopardised by a handful of complaining workers rushing to bring in the workers union they know little about.”
Government is yet to react officially to the set of problems to emerge during the week by Samoans contracted for work in Australia under the seasonal workers scheme.
The New Zealand season workers front has remained relatively quiet since this anxious publicity on the scheme started making news headline in Australia’s main stream media.