Immigration policy under “free market” economies is designed to keep working people down – not out. Capitalist “democracies” love to have large segments of the working class with no, or very few, rights – and that is true for New Zealand as well. The US has at least 11 million so-called “illegals”. Some estimates put the number nearer 20 or 30 million (Daily Signal, 27/12/15, http://dailysignal.com/2015/12/27/you-only-think-you-know-how-many-illegal-immigrants-live-in-the-us/). Maintaining their status as a pariah sector of the working class through periodic deportations of some is designed to keep those millions free to be exploited to the fullest extent possible.

In New Zealand, it is difficult for people to simply cross our border so this Government has implemented a policy to achieve the same goals “legally”. It has done this by dramatically increasing the number of workers on temporary work visas while making it harder to transition to permanent residence. While there are only around 10,000 so-called “overstayers” in New Zealand, that is people who have overstayed a visitor or work permit, there are 200,000 workers legally in New Zealand on “temporary” work or student visas.

The total work force of the country is 2.4 million people. Most of these precarious workers are desperately hoping to transition to being a permanent resident. They are also often not permitted to change their employer and are “free” to be abused and exploited as a consequence (Radio NZ, 13/4/16, “Show Compassion To Overstayers, Immigration NZ Urged”, http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/301347/show-compassion-to-overstayers,-immigration-nz-urged).

Parallel with the work visa exploitation there has developed an industry to attract fee-paying students to do courses of little educational value just so the student can a get a leg on the ladder that for one in six of them may lead to permanent residence. There is evidence of corrupt behaviour at all stages of the process from recruitment, training, and qualifications gained (NZ Herald, 20/11/15, “NZ Reputation At Risk From Indian Student Exploitation”. http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11548482).

Shocking Stories

There are shocking stories being reported almost weekly in the media (for example, see Wireless, 27/1/16, “Left Without A Choice: How International Students Are Exploited In New Zealand”, http://thewireless.co.nz/articles/left-without-a-choice-how-international-students-are-exploited-in-new-zealand). Workers being paid a few dollars an hour, workers paying the boss the equivalent of their own wage or the difference between the minimum wage and the manager’s salary they are meant to be getting, workers simply buying jobs and sponsorship.

I have heard that the market rate to buy a chef's job is now up to $80,000. It is often students from poorer backgrounds who get trapped into these situations. They are trying to alleviate the financial burden on their families created by the very high school fees by working as many hours they can for whatever pay they can get. One horror story involved virtual slavery for a migrant worker in a restaurant in Christchurch (NZ Herald, 11/11/14, “Christchurch Chef Awarded Close To $175,000 In Compensation”, Sophie Ryan, http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11356746).

The silver lining was that, as in this case the employer was prosecuted by the Ministry for Business Innovation and Employment (MBIE), that compensation should be paid. But that is not guaranteed. Often in situations like this the employer winds up their business, the worker gets nothing and they reopen with a “new” owner on the books (Daily Blog, 24/7/14, “Employers Liquidating Companies To Avoid Paying Minimum Entitlements”, Tali Williams, http://thedailyblog.co.nz/2014/07/24/employers-liquidating-companies-to-avoid-paying-minimum-entitlements/)

This example may be extreme but In November 2014 MBIE found 16 Christchurch labour hire and construction companies to be in breach of employment laws through a series of proactive audits it carried out. 40 audits were carried out, 23 completed and 16 – that is 70% of the completed audits – to be operating illegal exploitative practices (Live News, 5/11/14, “MBIE Audits Find Christchurch Companies In Breach Of Employment Laws”, http://livenews.co.nz/2014/11/05/mbie-audits-find-christchurch-companies-in-breach-of-employment-laws/).

Many of these involved migrant labour brought in for the post-earthquake rebuild. This is the only time I know of where MBIE has done a pro-active audit of companies – that is, it hasn’t waited for a complaint before acting (TV3, 3rd Degree, 16/7/14, “Christchurch Rebuild Migrants Face Debts, Cramped Accommodation”, Michael Morrah, http://www.newshub.co.nz/tvshows/3d/christchurch-rebuild-migrants-face-debts-cramped-accommodation-2014071618#axzz4Dga0a8vn).

The current Government vastly expanded the number of students and workers being given temporary work visas each year to its current combined annual total of around 250,000. A whole new sector of Private Training Establishments (PTEs) has grown up to provide courses to the desperate students. But the State education system as a whole from high schools through to polytechs and universities, after being squeezed of funding by the Government, has become dependent on fee-paying students to survive.

This was essentially admitted by Mark Flowers, the Chairperson of the Metro group of six big metropolitan institutes of technology: “We have absorbed cost increases for some years now without really the ability to raise fees. It is getting tighter, there’s not as much head-room as there was. On the other hand increasing international revenues has definitely assisted, and I think we’re putting in better systems” (Radio NZ, 10/6/16, “Polytechs Earn $150m From Foreign Students”, http://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/306045/polytechs-earn-$150m-from-foreign-students).

Double In Size By 2025

The Government hopes to double the size of this industry from its current $2.6 billion to $5 billion by 2025 (The Wireless, 20/6/16, “Hundreds Of Students At Risk Of Deportation”, http://thewireless.co.nz/articles/hundreds-of-students-at-risk-of-deportation). To achieve that goal the Government radically increased the range of students able to work while studying. Currently, there are about 100,000 fee paying students (Education NZ, New Zealand International Education Snapshot, January-August 2015, http://www.enz.govt.nz/markets-research/general-research/new-zealand-international-education-snapshot-january-to-august-2015.

They have been told they can get work while they study, and job offers when they graduate, and ultimately permanent residence with ease. Many of them have taken on loans to fund their studies (Interest.co.nz, 13/6/15, “What Lies Beyond The Millions of Dollars Of Fees We’re Collecting From International Students?”, Jenée Tibshraeny, http://www.interest.co.nz/business/82061/what-lies-beyond-millions-dollars-fees-were-collecting-international-students).

Students graduating from a course in NZ are eligible for a 12 month work visa. If they can find work that is relevant to the qualification that visa can be made in a temporary work visa for two years. If they are lucky this can be extended a further two years. Permanent residence is only possible for skilled jobs, often with some managerial responsibility. Huge fees are charged at all stages of the process. Prior to 1987 New Zealand ran what was effectively a “White New Zealand” immigration policy with a small exception for Pacific labour to work in the industries that were being promoted following World War Two. Until 1935 Asians were not allowed to become New Zealand citizens and were excluded from eligibility for all welfare benefits - including benefits for widows, the blind, children or unemployed - even if they were born in New Zealand.

Following World War Two Government officials implemented a policy that restricted the entry of refugees. In a 1948 letter Prime Minister Fraser said the NZ selection team to decide on which refugees to admit would "be confidentially instructed to omit Jewish and Slav types as being incapable of full assimilation". The head of the selection team explained in 1951 that they had "rejected those whose colouring would create too great a contrast" with white New Zealanders.

The Government's Immigration Division summarised its policy in September 1966. It said immigration policy "is dictated by the relative ease with which different groups of people can be assimilated". Because of that they favoured people from Western Europe and the United Kingdom. Some restrictions were placed on people from Southern and Eastern Europe. "The peoples of Asia and Africa, being of a culture alien both to that of European and Polynesian New Zealanders, present more difficult problems of assimilation than any others.....These factors have caused us to place even stricter limitations from these countries than upon South Eastern Europeans".

But New Zealand's population continued to increase relatively slowly. The first million was reached in 1908, the second in 1952 and the third 21 years later in 1973. By the 1980s as many people were leaving New Zealand on a permanent or long-term basis as were arriving as new immigrants. This is what forced a change in Government policies towards new migrants. In 1987 the Government abolished the official policy of preferring migrants only from "traditional sources" - that is the white countries of Britain and Western Europe.

The 1990 National government adopted a policy of achieving a 20,000 annual net gain in migration. Once New Zealand started sourcing new migrants from anywhere in the globe using “objective” criteria that can be adjusted at will, Governments have been able to manipulate migrant flows to suit their own agendas. With China and now India becoming a major source of migrants there is also an almost unlimited potential inflow depending on policies adopted.

A big factor in migration flows is the relative strength of the Australian economy compared to New Zealand. For most of the period since the 1980s the Australian economy has grown much more strongly on average. Wages are also significantly higher as a consequence. As a consequence New Zealand has for some three decades been losing around 1% of its population to Australia each year. That loss has had to be compensated for if New Zealand capitalism was not to have a deep ongoing crisis.

Big Business needed labour to exploit at the cheapest price they can get away with and a domestic market to sell to. The migration inflows and outflows, has transformed New Zealand society with approximately one in four of its population born outside the country. In Auckland nearly 40% of its population of 1.4 million was born outside New Zealand. One in four Auckland residents is now Asian. The current Government appears to be opening the tap on migrant inflows. My guess as to their reasons include the following:

• The economy appeared to be stalling in 2013 and again in early 2015 after an initial period of recovery following the 2008 financial crash and subsequent recession. A positive migrant inflow of labour and cash can mask the economic slowdown that is occurring.
• Foreign labour was deemed important for the rebuild of Christchurch following the 2010 and 11 earthquakes.
• An aggressive recruitment of overseas students was agreed on in October 2013 which included liberalising the right to work while here saw numbers increase 25% to over 100,000 in a few years.
• Tourist numbers have been boosted by making it easier for Chinese and others to travel here. The May 2016 year saw a record 3.29 million visitor arrivals with Chinese numbers up 27% to 394,500.
• Employers in certain industries (tourism, hospitality, farming, horticulture) were complaining that they couldn’t attract enough staff (at the wages they were offering). In some industries that Unite represent, staff like tourist hotels and fast food, the bosses confessed that 30-40% of their staff were on temporary visas.

Significant Impact

The combined impact of these changes has been significant. For 22 months through to May 2016 every month saw annual numbers of permanent and long-term (PLT) migrants increase. The May 2016 annual net gain figure of 68,400 was a new record. This involved a record 124,000 PLT arrivals, less 56,400 PLT departures. The monthly net gains however have begun to decline which may indicate a slight moderating of the inflow. It dropped from a record monthly total of 6,200 in November 2015, to 5,500 in May 2016.

Using MBIE data for the 2014/15 year 170,814 temporary work visas were issued that year as well as 84,856 student visas. A policy change to allow more Indian students in has seen their number go from almost nothing a few years ago to be the largest country of origin group at over 10,000 (MBIE, “Migration Trends And Outlook, 2014/15”. http://www.mbie.govt.nz/publications-research/research/migrants---monitoring/migration-trends-and-outlook-2014-15.pdf/view).

In the last six years there have been on average 166,000 temporary work visas issued each year. These can be students, those on working holidays, seasonal workers, essential skills workers and migrant family members. In 2011 almost one in every 20 months worked in the economy are performed by temporary migrants. This is an increase from one in 100 a decade before in 2001. For hospitality, horticulture and viticulture it is more like one in ten months worked. The calculation of “months worked” is based on a person working for wages and salaries in that month for which IRD has records.

Hours worked could not be calculated. In 2011 those on temporary visas worked 4.3% of the 23 million months worked. International students worked about 150,000 months a year, essential skills workers about 230,000 months, working holidays’ visa workers 200,000 months, and seasonal workers 30,000 months. Indian temporary migrants are now the largest group with 180,000 months a year. “Accommodation” and “Food and Beverage Services” have 14% of all months worked performed by temporary migrant labour.

There are over 200,000 migrant workers in New Zealand on temporary work visas. Around 60,000 are on working holiday visas and the primary purpose of their visit is meant to be for holidaying. The inevitable result is they often work under the table. But at least they can quit their jobs and get new ones if the situation is very bad. There are also 100,000 here on student visas who can usually work up to ten or 20 hours a week and about 30% do. Most of the rest are on skilled worker visas where employment is tied to a particular employer. About 20,000 a year transition to residence from skilled work scheme

The 2014/2015 MBIE report also noted that only 17% of students were able to transition to residency five years after their first student visa. Similarly, only 18% of temporary work visa holders had transitioned to residency by three years after their first work visa. While the Government has massively increased the number of student and temporary work visa holders they have also significantly reduced the number able to get permanent residency from 50,000 a year to 43,000. That has been achieved by reducing the skilled migrant approvals from 35,000 to 23,000 (NZ Herald, 12/6/16, “We Need Doctors, Not Bar Staff”, Bernard Hickey, http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11654891&ref=rss).

The Government has removed a range of categories that were able to be used to get a residency visa including that of “restaurant manager”. We had members of Unite who had spent tens of thousands of dollars on bullshit courses and worked for companies like McDonald’s and Restaurant Brands to get promoted to a manager’s role, suddenly told that it was all a waste of time and money. We had a fantastic worker at McDonald’s who was on our union bargaining team for the negotiations in 2013. Her story was typical. She was smart. She came on a student visa, worked at McDonald’s, hoped to get a manager’s job and use that to transition to permanent residence.

She ended up wasting tens of thousands of dollars on courses in New Zealand that she did not actually need to do. She had a computer and management degree from a prestigious Indian university. She paid to repeat her studies essentially to get a visa. Many of the education providers that have been set up in NZ these last few years are taking advantage of these desperate “students” to make a profit. Even if the courses are NZ Qualifications Authority-approved and legitimate they would not exist unless the students believed they had at least a chance of transitioning to permanent residence. She was one of those who failed to get permanent residence for whatever reason. That was a loss to New Zealand. She would have made a fantastic member of our community. She was one of those who spoke up and fought for her co-workers. It is a loss to New Zealand that she didn’t navigate the system. But the system is a lottery. I think it is designed that way.

No Free Market For Labour

Employers always argue that they need to have the complete freedom to import labour virtually at will. At the moment tourism operators are screaming that they need more temporary workers and the Government should allow more in. In an article in the NZ Herald (10/11/14, “Foreign Worker Limits ‘Choking Tourism’”, Grant Bradley, http://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=11355841) they complained that New Zealand workers didn’t want to go and work in the regions. The General Manager of Goldridge Resort, Penny Clark, “said the ‘ideal’ of having Kiwis filling housekeeping or hospitality roles didn’t fit reality”.

Of course there is a simple answer to the problem of a labour shortage in places like Queenstown – pay better wages to attract the staff. When the market doesn’t respond to the price being offered – raise the price. It never seems to occur to the business operators that paying the minimum wage for work that can be very heavy and skilled like housekeeping and hospitality, and in parts of the country that are extremely expensive to live like Queenstown – just doesn’t add up.

It used to be a standard condition of employment in hotels like those in Queenstown that board and accommodation was provided. In those circumstances there was no problem attracting labour. Those conditions were eliminated along with set hours, overtime rates and much else during the dark days of the Employment Contracts Act in the 1990s and have never returned. It is no wonder the employers now rely on temporary migrant labour that they feel they can use and abuse.

The real beneficiaries of this system of indentured labour are often the biggest companies in New Zealand. We know that all the hotel chains rely on temporary labour, SkyCity uses them extensively; all the big fast food chains use this labour extensively. It is also the entire dairy farm sector which claims it can’t survive without recruiting labour from the Philippines – even when dairy prices were at record levels. The dairy farm owners, through their associations, are strong advocates of letting the free market work when it is to their advantage. But when it came to having to pay higher market prices to attract labour to work on their farms in Southland they got the Government to allow them to recruit in the Philippines instead.

Big companies also use migrant labour to reduce the wages of management staff. In the fast food industry wages for managers have declined 50% in real terms over the last couple of decades. Migrant labour has been used extensively to achieve this result. Management visas were good enough for permanent residence in the past. Running a McDonald’s, KFC, or Burger King store is a complex undertaking. There is usually between 50 to 100 staff and often they operate 24/7. The average wage for a manager today is around $40,000 a year. 20 years ago the average was over $60,000 in today’s dollars.

Occasionally Unite gets consulted by MBIE over whether a company’s application for the right to bring in labour from overseas should be approved. In November 2014, we got one about the SkyCity Casino; they wanted to bring in about 40 chefs of various sorts. I assume they too were claiming they couldn’t find people in NZ to do this work. 14 of the positions were commis chefs which is a junior position for which SkyCity was paying $15.69 an hour. That was $1.24 an hour above the minimum wage. I thought it would be useful to look at the “market rate” for this position. The law of markets says that if something is in short supply (including labour) then the price will rise.

The Restaurant Association of NZ does an annual survey on wage rates. It has the commis chef rate increasing only one cent an hour between 2009 and 2013. The 2013 rate of $15.80 is also above that being offered at the end of 2014 by SkyCity. The survey also found that the executive chef rate had fallen from $26.12 an hour to $24.52; food & beverage manager from $21.66 to $18.81 and head chef from $22.06 to $21.71. It seems that the industry is not pressured by shortages of labour to offer higher wages. In fact it appears to be using the importation of migrant labour to keep wages and conditions down.

The hotel and hospitality sector was turned into a minimum wage industry, not by importing migrants, but by destroying unions in that sector in the 1990s under the Employment Contracts Act. It is a fact, however, that it would not have been able to keep it a minimum wage industry when unemployment began to drop again in the 2000s if it hadn’t been able to use temporary migrants. So next time you hear someone from the tourism, hotel and hospitality sector complaining about the lack of skilled staff, tell them to start training staff and paying wages that will make that job worth doing.

Nothing To Lose By Joining Union

The withdrawal of the pathway to residency that the fast food industry had been offering meant that these workers now had nothing to lose by joining the union. The companies had used the carrot of possible future promotion to keep people in line and stop them joining the union, but with the carrot gone, our job has been made easier. These companies now have a genuine crisis on their hand. The truth is they have been paying well below market rates for management staff because the workers were focused on future residency, not their current wage. It will be very hard for the companies to get anyone who is NZ-born or has permanent residence to run a 24/7 store with up to 100 staff for around only $40,000.

Unite Union is trying to organise the managers in the fast food industry as well. At Restaurant Brands, we have been in negotiations over a collective agreement for managers. We actually have a higher union membership density among managers than we do for the overall workforce at KFC, because there is a lower turnover among them compared to the non-managerial staff. And most managers who get promotions remain members of the union because they trust us to do the right thing. The exposure of significant abuse of migrant workers in 2015 prompted the Government to tighten up on some laws designed to protect them. One change was to extend laws designed to protect workers not legally entitled to work to also apply to those who are. Employers with permanent residency who are convicted of exploitation can also be deported for up to ten years after gaining residency (Unite press release, “Barrier To Migrant Workers Exposing Abuse Still Unaddressed”, 4/10/13, http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/PO1310/S00045/barrier-to-migrant-workers-exposing-abuse-still-unaddressed.htm).

The Government also told MBIE to actively investigate and prosecute these cases. However, there are only about 40 inspectors in the country, with a workforce of 2.4 million. They are already swamped by their existing workloads enforcing minimum legal standards. The massive expansion of student numbers in the years ahead will open up a whole new area for potential exploitation and abuse (NZ Herald, “New Work Rights For Foreign Students”, 11/10/13, Lincoln Tan, http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11138314&ref=rss).

One thing we must never do is give up on any group of workers. We know from experience that as soon as they are confident, we can protect them. With protection, migrant workers will find their voice and help lead the fight against exploitation of themselves and others. Even Treasury, a Government department known to be on the side of the bosses in nearly all matters, has questioned the economic wisdom of the current policies. Bernard Hickey reported in the NZ Herald (12/6/16) that Treasury “released a series of papers over the past year that showed its growing discomfort with the increase in low-skilled migrants and the risk that they are displacing local workers and keeping wages down. As the Treasury officials noted:

“Current policy settings may not be doing all they can to support the growth of higher productivity firms and industries, including facilitating the flow of higher-skilled migrants to sectors of the economy where skill shortages may be acting as a significant constraint. In addition, our current approach to selecting migrants may have encouraged reliance over time on lower-skilled labour in some parts of the economy. This may have been discouraging some firms from either increasing wages and working conditions or investing, either in training existing workforce or in capital”.

When Treasury looked at the 21,000 migrants given residency in 2014/15 under the “Skilled Migrant Category” (SMC) they discovered that a “significant proportion” now works in low-wage occupations. The top ten SMC categories are chef, dairy cattle farmer, cafe/restaurant manager, retail manager, carpenter, dairy cattle farm worker, retail supervisor, aged or disabled carer, truck driver, registered nurse (aged care). The fact that there are hundreds of thousands of workers who are actually working in unskilled or semi-skilled jobs is proof that we actually need a cross section of labour – not just doctors, or aircraft engineers. But the ones who do come should have the same rights as any other worker to tell their boss to shove it and get another job. Without that fundamental right the employee has no power to prevent abuses.

The first step to protect these workers from exploitation is to give them similar legal rights to change employer. We don’t necessarily need to exclude them from working in New Zealand. We need to give the ones here more rights to stand up for themselves. The most important issue is ending the visas being tied to particular employers. It is nothing but a form of indentured labour. They have done this with some construction workers in Christchurch when abusive and exploitative practices were exposed there. That practice needs to be extended to all workers in New Zealand. It would then be much harder for the bosses to use migrant labour to undermine wages. It is simply a cruel and heartless policy that sees overseas students and workers competing with each other in a desperate and ultimately futile dream for over 80% of them to achieve New Zealand residency.

A World Without Borders

Personally I would like to live in a world without borders. The bosses are creating that world for themselves and their capital. Under all the free trade deals being signed in the world, Big Business can move its money and investments freely. Managers of transnationals also have the rights to come and go under these agreements. Workers will also be stronger the more rights and freedoms we have to live and work without being subject to abusive forms of exploitation.

I accept that New Zealand cannot do that on its own. But we could start at the regional level. The reciprocal rights to live and work in each other’s country we have with Australia should be extended to the Pacific Islands. NZ and Australian Big Business have been happy to exploit these countries and import their labour (and sports people) for decades. Pacific people should have the right to live and work in Australia and NZ without being labelled “overstayers”. We are all Pacific Islanders. It would also help redress the injustice inflicted on the many Samoan people stripped of their New Zealand citizenship rights in the 1980s.

Similarly we should demand the rights of permanent residence for all New Zealand workers in Australia. It used to be that NZ migrants to Australia got the benefits of permanent residence on arrival – including welfare benefits and access to education. The same rights applied to Australians moving to New Zealand to work. In 2000 the stand- down period of two years to access benefits was imposed on New Zealanders. Then, in 2001, only those who met the Australian requirements for permanent residence (skills, character etc) could access welfare and education rights. Most New Zealanders are now being denied permanent residence when they apply. Close to 300,000 Kiwis are now living in Australia without the equal rights that should be their right. They are in a much worse situation than other legal migrants.

Big Business demands the freedom to move its capital anywhere and have it protected everywhere. That is actually what treaty discussions like the Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPPA) are all about. They have very little to do with trade and have everything to do with creating an international bill of rights for capitalists. We also need an international bill of rights for workers. We can never stop workers seeking a better life. That is true for New Zealanders going to Australia or workers coming to New Zealand. We should support every step that equalises the status of workers here, whether they were born here or not.

As a first step, that means that no worker on a temporary visa should be tied to one employer. Any worker must be free to change employer at any time. Workers currently in this country brought here by the Government and bosses to use and abuse should have the first choice on staying. Anyone working in this country should have full employment rights no matter their legal status. Workers who expose abuse should be able to continue working legally while suing their boss for compensation.

All workers in a country’s jurisdiction should receive the legal minimums of that country at least. That should apply to all those “foreign” crews working to fish in NZ territorial waters. Any employer caught thieving from their employees’ wages, forcing workers to work for no pay, or denying rest breaks should face jail time in the most serious cases. Deliberately ignoring health and safety that result in death or serious injury should carry a corporate murder, manslaughter or maiming charge that can also result in jail time for the guilty. Unions can object and expose the hypocrisy of employers demanding the right to import labour while paying a pittance to their staff. But ultimately the only effective way to turn the situation around is to re-unionise the sectors and force the bosses to pay.

Organising these workers has been a huge challenge. Union organisers sometimes express frustration about the perceived docility of Indian workers. One organiser called them “the philosophers” because the standard reply to a five minute recruitment pitch was often a polite “I’ll think about it”, meaning “no”. “I’ll have to consult with my partner/parent/manager” is another typical refusal. But the reality of the fear is often whispered- “If we join the union, they will cut our hours and not give us the training steps we need to get the promotion necessary to advance along the immigration ladder”.

A turning point came in the “Bitter King” battle with Burger King in 2012 (Burger King accused of exploiting Indian and other migrant workers https://unitenews.wordpress.com/2012/08/16/burger-king-accused-of-exploiting-indian-and-other-migrant-workers/). When the union turned its organising efforts elsewhere, Unite was attacked from behind by a sophisticated union-busting campaign. Area managers worked with store managers to target and deregister union members on a store-by-store basis. As surviving delegates organised resistance, Indian workers found their voice and came to the fore, detailing many instances of super exploitation. After a high profile media campaign where Indian workers talked about “slavery” at Burger King, the company sued for peace and migrant workers had their first taste of victory. The union has now more members than ever in its history at Burger King. Indian and Fijian Indian workers are firmly in the leadership group.

Where we have completely broken that climate of fear, we have recruited these workers in the hundreds. In Restaurant Brands, which owns the brands KFC, Pizza Hut, Starbucks and Carl’s Jr, we have over 2,000 members – over 50% of the total staff number of these outlets. In the McDonald’s negotiations in recent years, the majority of our bargaining team were migrant workers from India. We have dozens of delegates across the country from India, China, Korea or the Philippines – to name just a few countries.

Racism A Cancer

A few members of Unite Union have commented to me that we have put too much emphasis on protecting the rights of migrant workers when “NZ workers” are also being exploited. It is absolutely true that anyone who works for an employer is exploited in some way. The most fundamental way that happens is that the employer pays less for the labour power they employ than they get for the products of that labour. All of an employer’s profit in the last analysis comes from the labour of workers.

However some groups of workers are able to be super-exploited for one reason or another – usually because they are in a weaker bargaining situation with their employer. Traditionally this has been true for women and young people. In the first half of the 20th Century Maori workers could be paid less. Until the 1970s in New Zealand many contracts (including collective agreements) had a lower rate of pay for women. Women weren’t considered the real breadwinner. They were only working for “pin money” and so could be paid less. This was also true for young workers until last decade when youth rates were finally abolished in most industries.

Some employers take advantage of migrant workers for the same reason. Many of these workers are desperate for a job and often willing to work for less or “go the extra mile” for the boss to prove they are good workers. Some aren’t “legal” in terms of their visas. Often this means working for less than the minimum wage in some industries. This super-exploitation can also be by bosses of their own ethnic group. But it can also be by a transnational company if the managers are given the freedom to take advantage of these workers.

If we allow this “super-exploitation” to exist – whether it is for women, Maori, young people or migrants – we allow the employers to hold all of our wages down. All wage systems are built from the bottom up. That means we all benefit if the minimum wage goes up because those who traditionally earn above the minimum can argue that their wages need to go up to maintain their margins for skill or experience. If a boss is able to pay one group of workers less or force one group of workers in a workplace to do things that are not acceptable – then eventually everyone is dragged down. So it is very important for a union to fight any signs of super-exploitation. In the end we all benefit because we are more united as a class and are able to fight harder to improve the situation for everyone.

Problems that can be identified as being linked to immigration, including the downward pressure on wages, can be resolved by empowering migrant workers, not by undermining their rights and marginalising them further. Ultimately, migration strengthens the economy and creates jobs. But when there is unemployment it is easy to point the finger at the newest arrivals and blame them. Unite accepts that immigration is a necessary part of the world in which we live. People will move and should have the right to move in the search for a better life. This is as true for New Zealanders going to Australia as it is for Indian and Chinese or Pacific Islanders coming to New Zealand. Unions should oppose anti-immigrant sentiment and fight for equal rights for anyone who works in New Zealand.