JULIA Gillard will reignite the foreign workers controversy with plans to introduce cash fines for bosses who fail to offer jobs to Australian workers first.

Warning that a "tick-a-box" approach currently applies to companies claiming they face local labour shortages without even advertising jobs, unions are pushing the Prime Minister to act before the September election.

The Sunday Telegraph can reveal cabinet will tomorrow night debate the measures, which include financial penalties for employers who lie or mislead authorities about labour shortages to import workers on 457 visas.

The 457 visa is the most commonly used program for employers to sponsor skilled overseas workers to work in Australia temporarily with a little more than 100,000 workers currently in Australia under the visa class.

The number of 457 visa classes has jumped 20 per cent in the last year.

Currently, bosses must claim there is a labour shortage to secure a foreign worker but do not have to prove it.

"Why do they like 457 visas if they have local labour available? Because they can deport these workers in a month," a senior government source claimed.

"It makes WorkChoices look like a picnic."

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/national-news/nsw-act/julia-gillard-reignites-war-on-foreign-workers-with-cash-fines/story-fnii5s3x-1226655069475#ixzz2V16rVpnL

If one reads the headline and what follows-on in the article, it's a not-so-subtle denigration of what the Prime Minister rightly wants to achieve, presented to us by this gutter press article in a pseudo guise to appear "balanced". In this discussion, of course, the merde-och press will remind us that Crean (who is supposed to be on the same side as Julia — ah ah) said: 

Last month, former Labor leader Simon Crean said the debate over 457 visas was a good policy with bad rhetoric.

"She's gone the class warfare," Mr Crean said.

Of course Julia had not gone "the class warfare"... But Crean had, by suggesting it.... Crean is a dithering Labor idiot who, like Abbott and many other people, is a closet misogynist who hates Gillard's guts because he's in love with Rudd — the saint Kev man...

Meanwhile, Tony Abbott is trying to lower his negative profile by being a "populist", when at best he's bordering on sociopathy... But that's my personal view and the view of many who are too scared to say so publicly...

Pay close attention to the chart at top.

Yes Gus,

It seems that we really are living in strange times?

Whilst the coalition parties promise an end to the unreasonable entitlement culture that they argue has beset the lucky country, the National Australia Bank has decided to play ‘me too’ with the latest ambulance-parking-at-the-bottom-of-the-cliff public sector fad, by offering its 46,000 valuable employees access to ‘generous’ paid domestic violence leave.

Meanwhile, with a federal Labor government driving our modern economy, the daily abuse of more than 2.5million less valuable casual employees continues unabated: out of sight & out of mind.

Once upon a time, in a universe far, far away, an employer like NAB would have gone to any lengths to avoid the cost of providing such ‘benefits’ to its workforce, whilst a real Labor government & a genuine trade union movement would have done something meaningful to assist the new working poor, expected to live quietly below the poverty line.

Whither Australia?

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/political-news/the-loved-and-loathed-20130601-2niau.html#ixzz2V2fD4FO1

Of course, there are "casual" workers who make it tough in present circumstances... But this has not been exclusively due to the recent government of Gillard, who has tried to discreetly rekindle the "union movement" and protect workers rights while avoiding being completely pilloried by the mass media press... I am not saying that her efforts have been perfect, but against the nasty waves of assault from the right-wing nuts, the GFC still creating havoc in Europe with 12.4 per cent unemployment and the nasty press, she has stemmed the tide of further deterioration which had accelerated under John Howard Rattus...

Wait for Tony Detritus to come with his big self-claimed "righteous" boots and his friends from "small and big business"... What would come out would be a move toward the complete destruction of unions and to the rise of slavery. A vote for Tony would be completely idiotic.

One problem with getting through the GFC without going into recession is that it's easy to think it was really no big deal. But even if you survive a car crash and say "well, at least we're in one piece", that doesn't mean there are no negative effects (or costs).

In the 10 months from August 2008 to May 2009 the unemployment rate rose from 4.0% to 5.8%. That was as fast as occurred in both the 1982 or 1990 recessions. The Australian stock exchange fell more than 50% in value from the end of 2007 to the middle of 2009. It is still about 25% below that 2007 high.

And what really smacked us is that this all happened at the very time many of the baby boomer generation were reaching retirement age. The economy thus has had to cope with the double whammy of a drop in participation and output that occurs during any downturn, and the first real hit from the ageing workforce.

It remains amazing Australia got through as well as we did.

read more : http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/grogonomics/2013/may/28/australia-economy-myths-gfc/print