One-third of Auckland jobless are migrants

By MATHEW DEARNALEY

Almost a third of unemployed Aucklanders are immigrants, many of them highly qualified.

This waste of human capital is spurring both the local and central government to act.

Auckland City Council staff have been told to investigate funding prospects for a specialist employment exchange, among a range of projects to reach out to communities struggling to find their feet in a strange land.

An application for $65,000 by the business advisory service New Ventures Trust to run a pilot scheme for highly qualified immigrants will feed into the council's next annual planning round.

This follows advice from a council report, drawing on Work and Income New Zealand figures, that 30 per cent of registered unemployed in the Auckland Central region are immigrants.

Council committees have also approved a networking day for Asian community groups early next year, and a pilot project to promote city services through Chinese-language radio and newspapers.

The push coincides with a promise by the incoming Labour-led Government to focus on the employment needs of immigrants, through a specialist agency if Work and Income is not up to the task.

Prime Minister-designate Helen Clark, whose Mt Albert electorate is about 18 per cent Asian and 15 per cent Pacific Islanders, said last night that Work and Income was more used to dealing with unskilled people.

She had doubts over its ability to cope with a more specialised role, particularly given its management woes.

But whichever agency was given the job, something had to be done to stop the enormous waste to the country of having the likes of skilled engineers and linguistics professors packing groceries in supermarkets.

While immigrant children tended to do very well in New Zealand, their parents were in danger of becoming "a lost generation."

Helen Clark said Labour was committed to changing immigration policy which allocated entry points for qualifications regardless of the occupational demand.

The city council report says migrants face discrimination in the job market, being perceived by employers as overqualified, hard to understand and unfamiliar with local work practices.

"Consequently the Auckland economy is not benefiting from the significant pool of intellectual capital."

It also voices concern that immigrants may be missing out on health services because of language or cultural difficulties, and are not being well enough informed to ensure successful integration into the host community.