Things go from bad to worse to catastrophic for Minister Little…
Immigration New Zealand yesterday descended on six properties across Auckland as part of an investigation into immigration fraud involving Indian and Bangladeshi nationals that allegedly uncovered “filthy” and inhumane living conditions.
The Herald was at one home during a multi-agency inspection yesterday where dozens of migrants were discovered crowded inside a three-bedroom Auckland home.
It is alleged the men from Bangladesh and India paid about $20,000 for job offers and employment agreements, but have received no work or pay since arriving in New Zealand.
It comes after Immigration Minister Andrew Little ordered a review of the accredited employer scheme earlier this month after “serious concerns” were raised by a whistleblower that proper checks were not being carried out.
…now cast your mind back to barely 2 weeks ago when Minister Andrew Little was being grilled by Jack Tame on Q+A over this accredited worker exploitation scheme.
Jack argued that barely 3% of the 27 000 accredited migrant exploiters had been reviewed and Andrew Little argued that was fine.
Then it turns out 40 exploited migrant workers were found crammed into a house living in filth.
The Minister stood by his claim that the priorly policed scheme was fine.
Then it turns out that number of exploited workers was actually 115.
The Minister demanded something be done.
Then it turns out Immigration Staff were warning their Wellington bosses that the scheme was ripe for exploitation but their Wellington bosses told them to shut up and rubber stamp the exploitation so greedy bosses in NZ could get their exploitable workers…
‘The system is f…..’: Immigration staff say bosses knew visa system didn’t work, and ignored it
Immigration New Zealand staff have been warning their managers for a year that the under-fire Accredited Employer Work Visa(AEWV) system has major flaws and is a recipe for migrant exploitation – but were ignored.
Concerned INZ staff say employers are being allowed to bring in migrants without any paperwork or financial checks, even when immigration officers fear jobs may be fake, paid for with illegal premiums, or the migrants will be exploited.
Instead, they say, they’ve been told to focus on faster processing times.
…the Minister said he didn’t know anything about that.
Now 6 properties have been raided and exploited migrant workers are living in filth.
Luckily for the Minister, no one is noticing his criminal negligence.
Thanks to 30 years of de-unionisation we are dependent on a low wage economy and the Bosses need to exploit that labour so they can profit.
We have learned nothing.
If we wanted to find a solution to this exploitation we would make union membership universal for all migrant workers, but of course that would stop the exploitation and NZ is built upon migrant exploitation.
The Minister is a former Union Boss, he should be deeply ashamed.
Increasingly having independent opinion in a mainstream media environment which mostly echo one another has become more important than ever, so if you value having an independent voice – please donate here.
If you can’t contribute but want to help, please always feel free to share our blogs on social media
Andrew Little proves yet again he’s not fit for office.
We are in it for you…..give us your vote.
What can go wrong!
And Andrew Little is one of Labour’s more capable Cabinet Ministers.
The Union Boss,Little,a big bully. He must miss pushing small business owners around.
As much as I think Andrew Little is a well meaning but utterly hopeless minister, this abomination came in under the amateur share broker himself, the “Honourable” Michael Wood
Little has had to take this hospital pass, much like Ayesha Verrall had to take the hospital pass for the Andrew Little fuck up that is Te Whato Ora, the same one that took out health service back to the Victorian era.
But rest assured, Wood is sitting there, costing us money as a clingon, watching this disgrace unfold. A decent man would resign, but not the “Little General”. He wants to inflict his incompetence on another generation!
Labours fault is hubris, not incompetence. They didn’t think that something that they create would suffer the same faults as the works of lesser civilisations.
They don’t think, end of story! Couldn’t boil an egg.
Agree but they are certainly good at breaking eggs.
Both @ Sam. A mix of arrogant self confidence and big time failure. But drawing on the leaky house debacle who is really to blame: Minister Little, officials in Immigration NZ, senior managers, the foot soldiers there to enforce compliance? Just one big fuck up. We know about the lack of checks and balances, with follow up on a tiny percent of accredited employers and it seems that those employers were checked only because of complaints. But now it comes to light these labour hire companies were given the green light some 12 months before any compliance measures were put in place, seemingly useless as they currently are. Trusting labour hire companies to be the guardians of a moral compass is both hubris and incompetence. Guilty as charged.
Y’all over egging it
No it’s both. We’ll be still fixing the work of this bungling government for years into the future.
Union membership would help. Eye on the ball by minister Little would help. Better awareness of exploitation would help.
Reported on RNZ this morning that ‘labour hire’ companies were implicated big time. Migrant workers tied to accredited labour hire companies is a recipe for disaster. And these companies are growing in number. What a surprise! If the RNZ report is to be believed its not the employers of Malaysian jockeys who ride trackwork, or employers who recruit overseas bus drivers, or those in the horticultural industry, but opportunistic shysters that have moved into the labour hire business. Who are these shysters anyway? Who runs these labour hire companies?
While it might be premature of me to suspect this what is the likelihood of other immigrants being involved in organising this scam? If they are I would hope that any citizenship/residency they hold will be revoked & they are sent back (less any ill-gotten gains). I suspect that things will not be that easy to resolve although the justice delayed is justice denied principle means that this should be resolved quickly.
I am not sure if citizenship can be revoked but there are a few who would qualify if it could .In Chch we have a booze outlet owner who while planning a 6 million dollar home riped his migrant working staff off to the tune of $125000 . The local council rewarded him by allowing his father’s name to be used as a street name .
That is just one of many and the situation has only got worse since Doo Little took charge of the Ministry in charge of migrat workers .He stuffed up Health more than it was which was pretty bad .Hopefully he and his usless mates will be looking for a new job come Oct.
Nope. Recruitment companies have done this kinda thing before. The Labour Hire companies are the main culprits for this scam. They are those Accredited Employers everyone talks about instead of naming and shaming them!!
“While it might be premature of me to suspect this what is the likelihood of other immigrants being involved in organising this scam?”
There are, JUST as there are various rogues (citizens/PR’s) in NZ involved.
The whole system is not as it should be.
I haven’t bothered looking at INZ’s website recently, but they used to encourage the vertical integration of immigration supposed ‘advocates’ and ’employers’. Charlatans handling the applications and clipping the very lucrative ticket.
They’ve (INZ – both as the policy advisor, and enforcer) built a system that’s going to become a rod for their own back.
Whether incompetence, casual attitude, inexperience, unintended consequences, or just an inability to see the bleeding bloody obvious – it needs to stop.
The funny thing is (and it’s a complete misunderstanding of cultural considerations), we’re going after a “free trade agreement”. Hark! some nations – even as fucked as they might be, don’t like seeing their nationals treated like shit. (I could have told Winnie the Poo that for free, the last time he tried it on in India accompanied by an enterage of ‘officials’).
There’s money to be made, and the unscrupulous will take advantage of it, and they’ve been doing it for several years.
Well said Bonnie.
Little is fuck useless as the minister of nearly fuckn everything! I know from personal experience that he’s useless at Treaty Settlements because he doesn’t know what he’s doing or talking about and all he wants is the photo op and to cut a shitty deal. Just look at his lastest attempt to Bully Ngati Rangi into a settlement with Pare Hauraki Collective that they didn’t agree to or sign up too! It was Littles mate Paul Majurey that stitched up a hui with NR and had talk. Hui ends and Majurey writes to Little and says that they’ve got an agreement with Ngati Rangi for the Pare Hauraki Collective redress settlement! He’s tried the same with Ngati Paoa by stitching us up with more than $200m of debt and loans for his Marutuahu and Ockham developments in Auckand without any financial reports(reporting) or Annual financial reports as per the Companies Act as a registered Company, and Angry Anal Little reckons all is well the fuckwit!!
So you can guess why I hope Labour crashes and burns at this election.
Just goes to show how little moral strength is left in Labour.
As little as National and ACT and all the other corporate stooges.
Martyn – Andrew Little was a “Union” Boss – aka Labour Minister in waiting…gone on October 14th
“…now cast your mind back to barely 2 weeks ago when Minister Andrew Little was being grilled by Jack Tame on Q+A over this accredited worker exploitation scheme.”
How about casting our minds back what is now several years!
True investigative journalists, worker’s rights advocates, lawyers, some academics, and even some within The Ministry for Everything (MoBIE ) have been pointing out the bleeding bloody obvious for years and it continues to fall on deaf ears.
Thankfully, RNZ have given it a good go this morning:
Migrants with visas linked to employers under investigation told not to come to NZ
RNZ Lucy Xia 06:00 30th August 2023
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/496853/migrants-with-visas-linked-to-employers-under-investigation-told-not-to-come-to-nz
Govt turning some migrants away at the border
RNZ Morning Report, 06:16 30th August 2023 w/ audio (May Moncur Employment Advocate with ‘No Win No Fee’)
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018904701/govt-turning-some-migrants-away-at-the-border
Migrants turned away at airport
RNZ Morning Report Lucy Xia, 07:09 30th August 2023 w/audio
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018904719/migrants-turned-away-at-airport
Migrant representative on people turned away at border
RNZ Morning Report, 08:09 30th August 2023 w/ audio (Mandeep Singh Bela)
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/morningreport/audio/2018904730/migrant-representative-on-people-turned-away-at-border
…. and then later on Nine to Noon a brief interview with Anu Kaloti.
Yea/Nah. We’ve become a country that’s obviously ‘comfortable’ with worker exploitation, slavery and treating some people like shit.
Immigration policy and the Children’s Commissioner debacle are the two reasons I can’t give Labour a party vote this election (after a lifetime), though they’re lucky they’ll get an electorate vote. And that now goes for a number of friends and family.
I’ve no doubt Andrew Little continues to have “complete faith in his officials”. He might be in for a shock, although given the Hughes is past his used-by date, he might be let off the hook – although probably not with voters
I had Angry Andy lined up to be a reheated next leader …
I think you are right that people don’t care now -Labour is toast, more stories of complete incompetence barely raise an eyebrow.
They are lame ducks, no one believes any promise they make as they try and backflip on whatever is politically convenient (except co governance.)
No one believes they can deliver anything, no one trusts a word they say.
This tuning out of the electorate should be frightening for Labour but their arrogant complete lack of self awareness means their upcoming pounding at the polls will still be a terrible shock.
Oddly when I came to the country to work it took several meetings and evaluation of my credentials, skills and my employer as well as my understanding of the contract before I got approval. This current scheme seems to do exactly none of that.
Add in Mr. “don’t look at me, it couldn’t have been my fault” Little who hasn’t done anything competent ever and I can guarantee no fixes coming.
This is the man who didn’t win a single election against an opponent (for his entire career pre-parliament as well) until the combined unions voted him in to lead Labour.
” The Minister is a former Union Boss, he should be deeply ashamed ”
No not really he is an example of the LINO party today , just another managerial class member.
If he had any real working class credentials he would never have allowed this to be happening in a country and economy that once valued human and workers rights.
He is a product of neo liberal takeover of what was once a force and opposition to capitalism at its most powerful and dangerous and ensured the many had protection and a voice but no longer.
I doubt there is any inch of shame from this capitalist union sympathiser he wouldn’t even know what he should be ashamed about. It just would not even register.
The LINO leadership and its caucus and MP’s and wider candidates and party members endorse this kind of cruelty as does the Nasties and ACT by not coming out publicly against this kind of free market slavery.
Just another example of why we need a new movement that stands amongst other things for human rights and strength based workers rights.