Since July, employers have had to be accredited to hire migrants for specific roles.
As part of the government’s immigration reset, announced in May, that scheme was to expand to all employers of migrant labour.
Minister of Immigration Michael Wood’s press secretary, however, tells Mountain Scene "further guidance will be provided in the coming weeks on that".
"We’re listening to the concerns of stakeholders, and working through implementation settings."
Those stakeholders include the Backpacker Youth and Adventure Tourism Association (BYATA), whose board members include resort hostel owner Brett Duncan.
"From a BYATA point of view, we’ve been trying to push Immigration [New Zealand] on trying to have the working holiday visas exempt as part of the accredited employer scheme," Duncan says.
Working holiday visa-holders, he notes, travel around NZ taking jobs Kiwis don’t want to do for two to four months.
If you’re a small operator, maybe a cafe owner, employing five or fewer staff, "it’s just going to be hugely detrimental to both local economies and the individual business", Duncan says.
"These people don’t work on the business, they work in the business, they don’t have time to sit down and go through the accreditation process.
"You’ll be asking tens of thousands of small businesses to be signing up to this.
"We shouldn’t be putting blockages on small business employing staff so they can get operating and get this economy moving forward."
Duncan accepts the government’s had concerns over employers exploiting migrant labour.
"That might be their stance, but I think if you talk to many in the industry, the working holiday visa-holders aren’t being exploited.
"They’re a vital part of our economy — I think generally they’re very well looked after, certainly in our industry."
Meanwhile, he understands working holiday visa approval rates have been strong, "probably ahead of pre-Covid levels", but workers are still slow to arrive.
That was always going to be the case, he says, "because they’re less likely to leave their summer to come to our winter".
Local hospo operator John Jones, who’s had his Arthurs sandwich bar in The Mall closed for two weeks due to staffing shortages, says the situation’s getting worse, not better, but asks where incoming workers will stay.
"Council need to sort their s*** out and get a little bit tougher on Airbnb."
