Highlights:
- One in four international students earn less than half the minimum wage, a study has found.
- The , led by Associate Professor Bassina Farbenblum from UNSW Law and Associate Professor Laurie Berg from UTS Law, found the proportion of international students who are egregiously underpaid has remained unchanged since 2016.
- A will gauge levels of financial insecurity, workplace exploitation and homelessness among international students and other temporary migrants during the pandemic.
Vijay, an International student from India, is studying at the Macquarie University in Sydney. He works two jobs to make ends meet. However, most of the time, the income from his 20 hours week work is not enough.
"After room rent, food and groceries, I have to save for the university fee too. Mostly I get the minimum wage but 20 hours of minimum wage a week is not enough," says Vijay.
So, sometimes he says he has to take a cash-on-hand job where the pay is less than the minimum wage.
A student visa allows one to work up to 40 hours per fortnight during term time.
Source: AAP
A study by UNSW and UTS has recommended that this limit should be removed as it is "a major source of source of international students vulnerability to exploitation" according to Bassina Farbenblum, one of the authors of the study.
The study is the work of UNSW Sydney's associate professor Bassina Farbenblum and UTS Law's Dr Laurie Berg.
After a survey on 5000 students, the study found that that 3/4 were earning less than the minimum wage.
"One in four international students were earning $12.00 an hour or less and for university bachelor students that grow to one in three students earning only $4 an hour or less," says associate professor Farbenblum adding that the situation is no better than what it was in 2016.
Listen to the full interview with A/Prof Bassina Farbenblum:
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Remove 40-hour work limitation on the student visa, recommends study
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"We conducted a similar survey in 2016, and the proportions were very similar so unfortunately, it seems that wage theft has just remained business as usual for employers of international students and indeed many other migrant workers in Australia."
A/Prof Farbenblum says a combination of factors is responsible for the situation.
"We've seen that we've got weak labour enforcement. We also don't have any kind of wage tribunal that's accessible so workers can't come forward to claim their wages."
The study highlights that international students are more prone to wage theft.
A/Prof. Bassina Farbenblum of UNSW, Sydeny. Source: Supplied
"Students are so vulnerable because of the conditions on their visa. And we know that the reason that many respondents in our survey didn't come forward because they were scared of losing their job or because they were scared of affecting their visa," explains A/Prof Farbenblum.
The report has made some recommendations to improve the conditions of international students.
Wage claims tribunal
Apart from removing the 40-hour per fortnight work condition, the study recommends that the government invest in strengthening labour enforcement mainly through the Fair Work Ombudsman.
"We recommend that government establish a wage claims tribunal so that workers can actually claim the wages that they are owed and in doing that they report wage theft because right now there's not much benefit to them coming forward might not get their wages back," says A/Prof Farbenblum.
Vijay says these steps are essential to change the working conditions of the students.
"When I was new in Australia, I worked for $8-10 an hour because I did not know anybody and survival was an issue. The alternative to not working at this rate was to sleep hungry."
A/Prof Blum says the situation has worsened during the COVID-19 pandemic. She says exploitations are only getting worse for international students during COVID as there are fewer jobs, and employers are looking for ways to cut costs.
Minimum wage to increase from July Source: AAP
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"We have undertaken a new survey that's open now to anyone on a temporary visa about their experiences during COVID to document the challenges that international students and others on temporary visas have faced during this time and see that we can help advocate the better support and indicate to the government the impact that the denial of JobKeeper payments have had on temporary migrants in Australia", says A/Prof Farbenblum adding that people on temporary workers can share their experiences on the .
