Skip to playerSkip to main content
  • 17 hours ago
Business groups have warned any major changes to migration could hurt the economy. Their intervention into the immigration debate comes as both the government and coalition look at how to cut migration.

Category

📺
TV
Transcript
00:01There is an agreement across the political divide that something needs to be done on
00:05migration and that the figure does need to reduce.
00:08The question is by how much and just exactly how you do that.
00:12So putting the figure aside in terms of policy, the government's yet to announce its full
00:17suite of measures that it will introduce in order to reduce the migration intake but what
00:22we do know and have confirmed is that they've slowed the processing applications for working
00:27holiday visas.
00:28So that just simply means that we're not getting in as many backpackers as quickly
00:32as what we were doing beforehand.
00:34The government hasn't explained why they've done this but they've simply just confirmed
00:38it.
00:38This is a bit of a more of a contentious issue within the coalition because working holiday
00:43makers are usually in the regions.
00:46That's where they go to fill spots where Aussies aren't doing the work.
00:50And so the Nationals are very much on board with working holiday visas.
00:53Nationals, Senator Matt Canavan, the leader of the Nationals, went so far on Friday as
00:57to say they won't be targeted.
00:59Which has led to a question, well is that coalition policy?
01:03Given we heard from some Liberals last week, in particular Andrew Bragg, saying that working
01:08holiday visas should be targeted in this mix of how you bring the migration rate down.
01:13So today we've heard from the opposition leader, Angus Taylor.
01:17He was asked, you know, in this case, Matt Canavan has said working holiday visas would
01:21not be targeted.
01:22Is that coalition policy?
01:24And we didn't really get a clear answer.
01:27Our target is to get migration to a level which is in line with housing supply, it'll be capped
01:33based on that.
01:34And we'll look at different visa classes and make appropriate decisions.
01:38What we don't want to do, and to Matt's point, is we don't want to undermine the skilled labor
01:42that our agricultural sectors need.
01:45And Matt made the point over the weekend in an excellent speech, that food security in
01:50this nation is under threat, particularly in some sectors, because it's just got too hard
01:56to farm.
01:56And Matt made the point over the weekend, and it's just got too hard to farm to farm.
01:57And Matt made the point over the weekend, and it's got too hard to farm to farm to farm.
01:58You
Comments

Recommended