Duncan Garner: 111,000 work visas while Kiwis sit unemployed

Forget the helicopters for a moment.

Yes, Christopher Luxon deserves criticism for using Air Force flights after telling voters he would do things differently. It is hypocrisy, and voters are entitled to call it out.

But it is also a sideshow.

The far bigger story is what is happening in New Zealand’s labour market.

Unemployment is at an 11-year high. The unemployment rate is 5.6 percent. Nearly 69,000 people have been without work for more than six months, while thousands more are looking for additional hours.

These are not abstract figures.

They are households losing income, mortgages under pressure and New Zealanders wondering whether the promised economic recovery will ever reach them.

And yet, during this period, the Government has issued around 111,000 work visas to overseas workers.

Why?

How does that make economic sense when tens of thousands of New Zealanders are desperate for work?

The system is working against itself

At the same time these visas were being issued, the Reserve Bank was deliberately holding interest rates high to slow the economy.

Its goal was to reduce demand, weaken the labour market and bring wage inflation under control.

Think about the contradiction.

One part of the system was trying to reduce demand for workers. Another part was approving another 111,000 workers to enter the country.

The left hand had no idea what the right hand was doing.

We pay highly qualified officials enormous salaries to manage these systems, yet nobody appears capable of explaining how the settings fit together.

That is not careful economic management.

It is madness.

Young New Zealanders are paying the price

The biggest warning sign is youth unemployment.

Around 7,300 more young New Zealanders joined the unemployment queue in just three months. Youth unemployment is approaching 14 percent, while unemployment among 15 to 19-year-olds is around 25 percent.

What are we telling a 19-year-old who has sent out application after application and still cannot get a start?

They see employers recruiting from overseas and understandably ask whether their own country has given up on them.

Welfare is not a career. It is not a pathway into adulthood. It is not the future young people dream about.

A country should be doing everything possible to help its young people gain experience, skills and independence.

Instead, too many are being left behind.

This is not an attack on migrants

Of course, many overseas workers fill genuine shortages.

They work in industries that need staff, bring valuable skills and make a significant contribution to New Zealand.

This is not about blaming them.

It is about the Government’s settings.

When unemployment is high, youth unemployment is surging and real wages are falling, it is entirely reasonable to ask whether issuing 111,000 work visas is the right policy.

Some of those workers are filling roles New Zealanders cannot fill.

But are all of them?

Has the Government properly tested whether employers could recruit and train people already living here?

Has it adjusted immigration settings as the economy has weakened?

Or is the system simply continuing on autopilot?

Recovery is something people feel

Luxon keeps talking about economic recovery.

But people do not experience an economy through Government press releases. They experience it through their pay packet, their mortgage and their grocery bill.

Can they find work?

Can their children find work?

Are their wages keeping up with prices?

Can they afford to stay in their home?

If the answer is no, speeches about recovery mean nothing.

Real wages have gone backwards, households remain under enormous pressure and unemployment is still climbing.

That is not what recovery looks like.

Where is Winston Peters?

There is another person who should explain this.

Winston Peters has spent decades saying immigration must serve New Zealand’s interests.

So where is he now?

Why is New Zealand First supporting the approval of around 111,000 work visas during one of the weakest labour markets in more than a decade?

Why is he not demanding that New Zealanders be given the first opportunity to work?

It is not racist or xenophobic to ask those questions.

It is the Government’s duty to ensure immigration settings reflect the needs of the country.

New Zealand needs skilled migrants. But it also needs a Government that protects opportunities for the people already here.

Right now, the balance looks wrong.

When New Zealanders cannot find work while the Government continues importing workers in enormous numbers, something has failed.

Christopher Luxon owes the country an explanation.