Pacific Islander Workers in Australia: Success Stories and Exploitation Concerns in PALM Scheme

Working on a wholesale nursery in Australia's food bowl has helped Gabriel Pama set his family in the Solomon Islands up for life.

"It's amazing. When I come and work here, I send money to my children, my wife, and help my siblings," he said.

Employed under the Pacific Australia Labour Mobility (PALM) scheme, Mr Pama has been working at Mossmont Nurseries, near Griffith, New South Wales, since 2020.

His employer, Jonathan Moss, said the scheme was brilliant, offering up a "win-win".

"We obviously pay them the Australian award wage, and they take that money, and they build houses, buy cars and start businesses back home," he said.

For Mr Pama, this rings true. He pays for his five children to go to school, has set up a small business, and built homes for his family.

But some of his friends on the scheme have not been as lucky.

"In Queensland and other places, they always say, 'Oh, we share a room with six people, and they have complaints,'" he said.

Their complaints echo the findings of a new report titled Improving PALM, commissioned by the Scanlon Foundation Research Institute.

It highlights issues around exploitation, lack of basic rights and policy shortfalls that need to be addressed in order to improve the scheme.

"The key issues are around the exploitation of workers by some employers and fixing the structural problem of workers being tied to one employer," said Peter Mares, the report's author.

Persistent Problems

Mr Mares spent several months researching and interviewing those involved with the scheme — including employees, employers, country liaison officers, volunteers, unions, and academics.

"I didn't speak to anyone deeply engaged in the scheme who thought it was a bad idea, who wanted to scrap the scheme," he said.

He did however find problems that must be addressed and made 10 recommendations to improve it.

"I think the most important reform is to give PALM workers themselves greater agency, and that means to give them a greater right to make it easier for them to change jobs within Australia," he said.

PALM scheme visas tie workers to their approved employer, which Mr Mares said left them with few choices if they are ill-treated or underpaid.

"Most [PALM employers] are very good, but as an employee, a PALM worker should not have to rely on the luck of getting a good boss to be well treated in Australia," he said.

Mr Mares also called for regulation of labour hire at the national level, simplifying PALM scheme rules for employers.

Workers should also have access to Medicare, he said.

"PALM workers don't have access to Medicare, and this results in them putting off getting medical attention when they might have an illness that needs treatment," he said. "They do have private health insurance, but it doesn't cover them for GP visits."

A spokesperson for the Department of Employment and Workplace Relations said the department was aware of Mr Mares' report. They pointed out that PALM workers could already transfer to another approved employer if concerns about accommodation, available hours or wellbeing arose.

Triple-Win

The PALM scheme employs about 32,000 workers from nine Pacific countries and Timor-Leste to fill crucial gaps in agriculture, meat processing, and aged care.

Despite his recommendations, Mr Mares said the scheme provided benefits to all parties.

"Everyone thinks the PALM scheme is a good idea," he said. "[It provides] income for Pacific Islanders from developing countries, jobs filled for Australian employers who have trouble attracting labour, and the advantage to Australia of improving our diplomatic relations in the Pacific, where we are in a strategic rivalry with China."

Jonathan Moss, Mr Pama's boss, also considers himself a "massive defender" of the scheme. He said 90 per cent of his workforce were PALM workers.

"When you're dealing with a live product that needs to be picked or packed or worked on today, not tomorrow, not yesterday, you need reliability, and that's what the PALM scheme has created," he said.

But the scheme has come under significant criticism, putting its participants in danger of exploitation.

"There's a few bad apples that do impact on the reputation of the scheme, and we're really committed to weeding them out," said Pat Conroy, the minister for Pacific Island Affairs.

Fulfilling Potential

Reports of workers experiencing abuse, underpayment, and living in overcrowded accommodation have dogged the scheme.

Mr Moss said whilst the scheme is well-regulated, it could benefit from some "fine-tuning". He said he would like to see the scheme improve workers' ability to move around and help them stay engaged.

"When PALM employees disengage from the program, that's when I find that they're at risk of really losing contact with their community," he said.

Mr Pama hopes to remain in the scheme for another decade, while he has the strength to work, before establishing a nursery in his village.

"I learned some skills here that if I go back to my community, then I will try to do that skill, apply that skill to the community, maybe the community will benefit as well," he said.