A working market

It was with interest that I read your article about the Italian mother of a little kiwi that was now facing extradition as her work permit expired.

In a tightening labour market it seems to be logical to make sure that citizens and residents get first chance; so far so good.

This morning I found myself ringing Telecom, only to be connected to a nice lady somewhere in India (?) to help me with my queries. So how about that? There are some jobs for Kiwis right there. And once I started thinking about it, how important are jobs for Kiwis really for our Gouvernment?

Because "outsourcing" seems to be all right, everyone does it, even SOEs. If we look back at the last decade of economic growth, we have seen so much of our production moving overseas, but that was all right, in a global market , wasn't it.

Now, as the world economy is on very shaky legs, we are getting protective of the jobs that are left. Understandable, but too late.

The thing is, you can't have it all, an open world market and full employment only go together for the so called emerging countries, here, we either have to stop the erosion of workplaces, or live with higher unemployment.

And really, qualified overseas workers are the least of our problems .