Permits to give Pacific workers priority

A plan to ensure about 5000 temporary work permits available for fruit-picking and viticulture work are first made available to people from the Pacific Islands will be unveiled today.

The pilot scheme will first include just six Pacific Island countries, but will eventually include all the members of the Pacific Islands Forum.

The permits for migrant workers are already available, but do not prioritise workers from the Pacific, where unemployment is becoming a major problem.

Under the plan, employers will have to prove they cannot find a New Zealander for the job.

They are then required to turn to the Pacific and will have to demonstrate they are unable to employ a person from that region, before seeking to employ somebody from outside it.

There will be strict conditions on employers, who will be required to pay the minimum wage. Employers will be able to use migrant workers on the condition that if problems emerge with the scheme they will not be entitled to use the permits in the future.

The countries initially set to benefit are: Fiji, Samoa, Tonga, Kiribati, Tuvalu and Vanuatu.

The scheme will be warmly welcomed by Pacific countries, who have long petitioned for greater entry, particularly for unskilled workers.

Helen Clark briefed Pacific leaders on the plan at the Pacific Islands Forum in Fiji yesterday.

The Prime Minister said the formal announcement was being made in New Zealand and not at the forum, because it was more relevant to the New Zealand audience.

But there was some speculation New Zealand did not want to embarrass the Australians, who have rejected calls to allow more Pacific workers into the country.

Australian Prime Minister John Howard yesterday made it clear that although Australia was willing to talk about the issue at the forum, he was unwilling to take a more flexible stand.

Mr Howard said he was not flustered by the New Zealand move. "No, that doesn't embarrass me at all. I see what we're doing on the Australian technical college [which trains Pacific peoples] and what New Zealand is doing on labour mobility .. as quite complementary."

Labour mobility is a serious problem for the Pacific, where high population growth and a growing youth population is exacerbating already dire unemployment - particularly in Melanesia.

A recent World Bank report found that within the next decade up to 90 per cent of the populations in the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu could be without jobs in the "formal sector".

It said greater labour mobility could play a key role in reducing poverty and increasing regional security in the Pacific.

Many Pacific island countries are now heavily dependent on remittances from overseas workers for a significant amount of their income.