The Fair Work Ombudsman has ordered a poultry farm in Newcastle to pay $20,000 in back-pay to sc417 workers but says that it is powerless to deal with many of the other abuses of the company. Perhaps DIBP and the Federal Police will be among the relevant authorities that will investigate these abuses. And chances are, DIBP may be faced with the issue of unregistered practice lurking in this complex chain which seem to involve several layers of subcontracting in order to bring young workers from Taiwan and Hong Kong to the poultry farms.

The Fair Work Ombudsman issued a statement saying that it is concerned about the sub-contracting arrangements it identified during the course of its investigations which it believes contributed to poor record-keeping practices and underpayment of minimum entitlements.

The ombudsman, “found connections between companies in the contracting line beneath the principal sub-contractor whereby they shared the same accountant, interchanged directors, listed individuals as signatories on bank accounts and transferred supervisors from one company to another as labour hire contracts were signed.”

The ABC reports that the Newcastle branch of the Australasian Meat Workers Union identified the labour hire company as Pham Poultry, which is providing employees for the Baiada plant, near Newcastle.

Craig Bildstein, from Fair Work, says his officers are sometimes quite shocked by the poor safety standards people are working in.

The DIBP website has the following information on this page titled DISCLOSURE LOG.

When clicking the link the document below appears. 

I just received this link: 

THIS LINK IS NOT HOSTED OR CREATED BY MIGRATION ALLIANCE.  WE CANNOT TAKE THE LINK DOWN AS WE HAVE NO CONTROL OVER THE SITE THE LIST IS HOSTED ON.

As predicted the list has now surfaced.

Auburn and surrounding suburbs is home to an extraordinary number of people from diverse backgrounds. The immediate electorate is one of the most multicultural in Australia. In the Auburn CBD, it's nothing to say hello in Arabic, Somali, Turkish, Persian, Mandarin and English.  Michael Jeremy and family have worked in Auburn since the 70's and been part of the changes in the area.

In conjunction with Migration Alliance, Michael Jeremy is hosting a Migration Alliance "Immigration Clinic" at 35 Norval Street Auburn (opposite Auburn Hospital on the corner of Hevington Road).

Consultation will be free of charge to residents who arrived in Australia as part of any Humanitarian program. The clinic will be open Tuesday and Thursday from 0900 to 1200 hours from 26 August 2014.

Migration Alliance, the leading Australian membership organisation for registered migration agents  have introduced a new partnership service with award winning Foreign Exchange and Money Transfer Specialist, TorFX.

All 4,200+ of Migration Alliance members have access to a directory of third party professional services promoted through their membership, which includes private health insurance, real estate, education and now with TorFX, foreign exchange.

TorFX have been established in the UK since 2004 and have become a recognised provider across the emigration market for clients migrating to Australia and New Zealand. Last year they opened their first Australian office to cater for the growing demand for their services across The Asia Pacific.