ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the elements which arise in temporary labour programmes across most Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries. Australia has followed international trends embracing the use of temporary visas to address labour market demands, attitudes towards temporary migrant labour remain markedly ambivalent. The 'Australian standard' in the title to this chapter refers to the newly federated nation's aspirations in 1901 for egalitarian industrial citizenship. At that time, protectionist commitments to robust and centralised industrial arrangements coincided with hard-line immigration restrictions on non-Anglo Saxon labour and rejection of temporary migrant labour whether from Britain or elsewhere. Unlike most countries in the OECD, Australia continues to have no dedicated low-skill migrant labour programme. At the same time, since the mid 2000s hundreds of thousands of international students and working holiday makers, ostensibly on 'cultural exchange', have proliferated in highly insecure and low-paid jobs.
