One thing this pandemic has done is shine a light on the people living in the shadows of affluent societies — the invisible people we usually don’t think about.
In Australia, the Federal Government has pulled together a stimulus package designed to support businesses and workers survive the lockdown-inspired partial shutdown of the economy, underpinned by ‘we had to draw the line somewhere’ thinking.
Where they drew the line leaves a lot of people in the wilderness.
There are hundreds of thousands of international students and migrant workers in Australia with valid work visas. They make up a significant portion of the casual workers who lost their employment thanks to the lockdown.
But, they’re not Australian citizens, so our government drew the line above them — not even the hundreds of thousands of New Zealanders who arrived after 26 February 2001 made the cut.
Yes, the Government relaxed the work hours rules for international students. Not really all that helpful when they’ve lost their jobs and the economy is in shutdown — unless they’re medical or nursing students who can join the covid-19 front line. They’ve been given permission to access $10,000 from their superannuation accounts — if they’ve been lucky enough to accumulate that much through their 20 hour a…