Frosty treatment of Vietnamese workers angers people in Ostrobothnia

Strict regulations and bureaucracy hamper work-based immigration from outside EU

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By Tapio Mainio
     
      Vietnamese Nguyen Dung, aged 28, is spray-painting boards for a bookcase at P. Rotola-Pukkila Oy, a company manufacturing furniture in the town of Kauhajoki in Ostrobothnia.
      Nguyen Dung’s hourly rate is EUR 10, which means that by noon he has earned EUR 40, which equals the monthly earnings of a worker in Vietnam.
      Another Vietnamese worker Hai Dang, aged 32, is feeding birch veneer into a glueing machine.
     
”You Vietnamese are hardworking people. The town of Kauhajoki would like you to stay here and bring even your families here”, said Antti Rantakokko, the Town Manager of Kauhajoki, when he addressed a 18-member group of Vietnamese men at the Kauhajoki Town Hall in October 2008.
      The town of Kauhajoki and the local entrepreneurs decided to recruit Vietnamese workers, as labour force was not available in Finland.
      ”I advertised for spray painters in a local newspaper. I even promised to organise on-the-job training. No applications were received. Later on I managed to employ one Finn, but he did not like the job”, says Managing Director Mikko Rotola-Pukkila.
      He is well satisfied with the Vietnamese employees.
     
It seems now that Rantakokko’s wish for bringing the families of Vietnamese workers to Finland is not going to come true, as the minimum financial subsistence requirement based on the Finnish Aliens Act is too strict.
      According to the law, Dung’s monthly wages are not high enough in order that he could provide for his wife and child in Finland.
      Dung’s wife Le Thi Cham and his child Nguyen Le Huong Ctiang are already in Kauhajoki, but they have only tourist visas.
      The Finnish Immigration Service has not granted them residence permits.
      Hai Dang would also like his wife and child to move to Finland, as it is hard to live apart.
     
”The income limits have been set in cooperation with the Ministry of Social Affairs and Health. A decision on the first residence permit is made by the Finnish Immigration Service, and an extension of the residence permit is issued by the local police department”, says Senior Adviser Jarmo Tiukkanen from the Finnish Immigration Service.
      According to Tiukkanen, finding at least a part-time job in Finland for the spouse could be beneficial.
     
Rotola-Pukkila fears that tight regulations could drive conscientious workers away from Finland.
      ”A tourist visa has to be renewed in the applicant’s native country. It is a laborious process and an expensive one. If the same income standards were applied to Finns, many people in Kauhajoki would not be considered able to provide for their families. Dung’s monthly wages are higher than the salary, for example, of a library assistant or a special needs assistant in the local school”, Rotola-Pukkila notes with some amazement and no little irritation.
      ”The regulations should take into account local differences. In Kauhajoki rental homes are inexpensive. Vietnamese workers can save money as they are used to living a modest life. Moreover, they use a bicycle as the principal means of transportation”, Rotola-Pukkila adds.
     
Formia, a metals and engineering company in Kauhajoki, was forced to lay off its ten Vietnamese employees temporarily.
      ”At the same time, their work-based residence permits were cancelled and they would have had to leave the country. Luckily, the Seinäjoki Police Department was flexible and granted them residence permits for studies, even though they do not take part in any vocational training, but study Finnish”, reports foreman Kari Anttila from Formia.
      ”If the possibility of laying off employees were recognised in the Aliens Act, we could have employed them temporarily for an installation job we had in Ukraine. A student is allowed to work only 25 hours a week”, Anttila adds.
      Yet some of the Vietnamese have had to leave Finland.
      Even Thanh Nguyen, who is participating in on-the-job training at Kauhacomp, a company specialising in trophies, will have to return to Vietnam in August.
     
”The frosty treatment of the Vietnamese who have come here to work really angers me. At the same time, the state is pampering refugees who have been brought to Finland through the channels organised by the Finnish Immigration Service”, Anttila adds.
     
     
BACKGROUND: Too low income to allow for family connection
     
The government is discussing a proposal to ease work-related immigration by reducing some of the bureaucracy involved in it.
     
The integration of the Vietnamese recruited in Southern Ostrobothnia has been hampered by the minimum financial subsistence requirement based on the Aliens Act. The wife and child have not been granted residence permits as the husband has not been found to earn enough in order to provide for his family, when the wife has no job.
     
The husband should have a net income of EUR 900 per month to support himself, another EUR 630 to support his spouse, and EUR 450 per month to provide for his child.
     
In order to provide for a family with one child, a man should thus have net earnings of EUR 1,980 per month.
     
The gross monthly wages of spray painter Nguyen Dung are about that size.
     
The size of the working-age population in the three administrative provinces of Ostrobothnia is declining by 2,000 persons a year. The labour shortage is predicted to worsen abruptly when the recession begins to abate.
     
In the entire country, the size of the working-age population will decline by some 300,000 individuals by 2030.
     
     
Helsingin Sanomat / First published in print 26.4.2010


Previously in HS International Edition:
  SDP´s Heinäluoma criticised over comments on work-based immigration (26.4.2010)
  Thors: Deliberate deception in immigration debate (22.3.2010)
  Foreign Minister Stubb defends immigration and multiculturalism (19.3.2010)
  Unexpected debate over quota refugees (25.2.2010)

See also:
  Survey: More than half want tighter immigration controls (31.3.2010)

Links:
  Kauhajoki

TAPIO MAINIO / Helsingin Sanomat
tapio.mainio@hs.fi