Mike Williams: Government must tread warily in immigration high-wire act

Mike Williams

With about 80,000 young Kiwis classified as not in employment, education or training (NEETs) it seemed strange that contractors building the Transmission Gully motorway out of Wellington were asking Immigration New Zealand for permission to recruit and employ 100 foreigners to work on the project.

The positions on offer included operators of heavy machinery which requires some degree of skill (I know this because I once caused a near disaster by assuming that because I'd got a heavy traffic licence, I could also drive a combine harvester), but surely it would not be beyond the contractors to harvest the supply of unemployed Kiwis and offer some training?

Regrettably the problem is not as easily solved as this, and as a director of Ritchies Transport, which is also requesting migrants to alleviate a shortfall of 100 bus drivers, I know that right now recruiting immigrants often turns out to be the only possible answer to labour shortages.

Weaning the country off the very high levels of immigration that developed on the National Party's watch won't be quick or easy.

During a spell in hospital a couple of years ago I noted that only one of the many nurses I encountered while recovering from an operation was a Kiwi.

Many of the foreign nurses were on their OE from a range of countries while many more had come from the Philippines.

A friend in the retirement village industry tells me that as much as 40 per cent of workers in that industry are also sourced from the Philippines and that the care industry would collapse without these migrants.

A similar picture is to be found in dairying where the rapid growth in employment in that industry over the past decade has also been met largely by immigration.

Complicating matters for the new Government is that immigration has the potential to be a hot issue as a segment of the voting public can become annoyed if the tide of new immigrants is perceived to be displacing Kiwis from jobs and houses and putting a strain on education and health structures.

Politicians will all remember the surge of support for New Zealand First that followed a speech by Winston Peters attacking high levels of immigration some years ago, so the Labour-led Government will have to move carefully if it is to balance the genuine needs of the economy with its promise to bring down immigration numbers.

To manage this high-wire act, Immigration Minister Iain Lees-Galloway will need to call on some serious political skills, but he is likely to be equal to the task.

Lees-Galloway won the seat of Palmerston North in 2008 by just over 1000 votes.

He managed to defy the heavy swing to National in regional New Zealand in that year which practically wiped Labour out in the regional New Zealand electorates and held the only provincial city for Labour until Stuart Nash took the Napier seat in 2014.

Lees-Galloway worked hard to build his majority to more than 6000 votes in last year's general election and is highly regarded by his colleagues.

Migration flows reached 72,000 in the year to July 2017 but are now ebbing.

Economists predict the net gain to fall to 50,000 in 2019 so it is possible that the coalition Government will be able to meet its goal of a significant reduction in migrant numbers without the kind of radical cut-backs which might jeopardise the industries mentioned above.

Some years ago a major Hawke's Bay grower posed the following conundrum.

At the height of the harvest season about 3000 immigrant workers were imported specifically to bring in the crops, yet unemployment numbers in Hawke's Bay never seemed to fall below the same number of 3000.

"What," he asked me, "is going on?"

The same grower has bent over backwards to connect with these people and guide them into paid work with some considerable success but knows just how difficult this task can be.

If the Government is to access the labour potential of these NEETs and the "hard core" unemployed and reduce the need for immigrants in jobs like bus driving, the care industry and even bringing in the harvest in the Bay, there will need to be one-on-one engagement and a range of strategies.

This Government has got off to a good start by making the first year of tertiary education free and that strategy has already seen the number of people in training and at polytechs. Employers, especially in the trades, may need further encouragement to take on these workers.

A big leap in the right direction is to get these people their drivers' licences. You can't take a job if you can't get to work.

• Mike Williams grew up in Hawke's Bay. He is CEO of the NZ Howard League and a former Labour Party president. All opinions are his and not those of Hawke's Bay Today.