A Bacchus Marsh apple farmer says while Employment Minister Eric Abetz’s suggestion that jobless Australians under 30 should take up fruit picking was a good idea, it may not translate in reality.
Nick Dellios, of Dellios Apples, said the doors were always open for eager long-term fruit pickers, but it was important not to pigeonhole young unemployed people into industries they may not be keen on.
“We’ve got to be careful about how the fruit is picked. It can’t be bruised or damaged,” he said.
“A lot of money goes into growing the fruit before it’s even harvested. Farmers have got enough issues beyond dealing with people who don’t want to be there.”
Mr Abetz, a Tasmanian senator, was promoting the government’s “earn or learn” policy for Australian youth when he said that if 90 per cent of fruit picking work in his state was done by foreigners, there was no reason young unemployed Tasmanians could not do the same work.
Senator Abetz said on May 26 that young people had no right to rely on their fellow Australians to subsidise them.
He used himself as an example of the earn or learn philosophy in practice, telling the ABC he had taken jobs driving a taxi, delivering bread and working on a chicken farm while he was at university.
‘’There is no right to demand … that just because you don’t want to do a bread delivery or a taxi run or a stint as a farmhand that you should therefore be able to rely on your fellow Australians to subsidise you,’’ he said.
Mr Dellios said that at the peak of the harvest season, his farm had 50 to 60 fruit pickers.
“Anyone can do it, but the physical weight of the bag can take getting used to. It’s about 30 kilograms,” he said. “You’re out with the cold mornings, and it’s physically demanding. But at the same time, you’re in the fresh air, surrounded by nice people.”
A Victorian Farmers Federation spokesman said Senator Abetz’s idea was not as simple as he made it out to be.
“There’s always a shortage of pickers so any encouragement is positive but far more complicated than redirecting young people into picking fruit,” he said.
Labor MP Catherine King said seasonal work would not address long-term youth unemployment.
“By axing Youth Connections, a program that has prevented almost 1400 young people from Bacchus Marsh to Ballarat from falling into unemployment, Tony Abbott threatens to lead disadvantaged young people into a vicious poverty cycle with nowhere to turn,” Ms King said.
With
The Age
