Foreign labour exploited

The lead story in 23 February Sunday Star Times reported how three Ukrainian students on a New Zealand government-approved scheme were made to work 15 hour days, 10 days in a row, for dairy farmers for $713 (US$1=NZ$1.8) per fortnight. By law, working 15 hours per day for 10 days should earn them $1,270 per fortnight.
The students were brought to New Zealand by a Ukrainian man living here, who charged them NZ$2,000 each for work permits and deducted NZ$120 per week from each students pay for administration and repatriation expenses.
The students complained to the Human Rights Commission. The three who went to the media walked off the job and are in hiding, fearing ‘retribution’, according to the report.

The farms where they worked are heavily capitalised - one was milking 900 cows.
Farmers have a reputation as the worst employers in the country. They often work very long hours themselves, and like their workers can be burnt out at a relatively young age. But whereas the owners will retire on a couple of million bucks, the workers/contract milkers end up with nothing but ruined health.

On TV the Immigration Minister said she would not be issuing any more work permits for farm workers with ‘skill shortages’ until the students complaints have been investigated. But she sounded unsympathetic to their situation - all her effort went into covering her own back.

On the matter of ‘skill shortages’, there is provision under immigration law for employers to bring workers into the country where they can show there are not enough skilled people here. But these Ukrainian students are not skilled at milking 900-cow herds - they are simply recruited as cheap labour, to be used and abused.

Dissatisfaction continues at Kinleith

After short strikes in December and January over redundancies (see ALU 45), workers at the Kinleith pulp and paper mill voted for an indefinite strike on 8 March, and were still on strike when ALU went to press in mid-April. The workforce was halved early in 2003, and maintenance work is now contracted out.

270 workers at the Carter Holt Harvey-owned mill are demanding a new employment contract as the previous one expired in March 2002, after the company tried to introduce new non-negotiated working practices, and wants to impose a new ‘human resource management’ pay structure that would abolish overtime payments.
The company is also taking legal action against the workers’ union, EPMU, to claim damages for the previous strikes.

www.wsws.org, 15 March 2003