US Congress debates expanding controversial visa programme World news guardian.co.uk

It was last updated at 15:39 on April 21 2008. Jack Brooks would prefer to hire Americans to clean and cook crabs for his seafood wholesaler. But it's tough, seasonal and low-paying labour, and native-born workers these days seem to have better things to do.

They have other opportunities," he said, noting that the local work force in his area is far better educated than when his family founded the company in 1890. We just don't have enough Americans to do that work anymore." So Brooks relies on Mexican workers willing to take jobs that last only through the 10-month crabbing season, and pay between $5.85 (2.95) and $15 (7.50) per hour.

Brooks and a coalition of business groups came to Capitol Hill in Washington to ask the US Congress to expand a controversial visa programme that allows foreign workers to take seasonal, low-wage, temporary jobs Americans will not do. The number allowed in the country is now capped at 66,000, down from roughly 130,000 last year. Labour and anti-immigrant groups have aligned against the expansion, with some calling for its overhaul or elimination.

The debate over the work permits, called H-2B visas has been subsumed in the larger debate over how the US government should handle the estimated 12 million undocumented immigrants in the country. With a new president set to take office in January, it's unclear when the issue will be resolved. Backers of the programme say it should be expanded from the current cap because companies in seasonal industries are burdened by a shortage of American workers willing to take those jobs.

Labour groups and some economists oppose expanding the programme and instead call for its elimination. They say that with the US on the brink of recession, unemployment on the rise and wage growth virtually stagnant, US companies should not be recruiting foreign workers.

Companies as diverse as hotels and seafood processors, however, say they cannot stay in business if they cannot bring in foreign workers to wait tables, clean guestrooms - and pick crabs.

One question central to the debate is whether a labour shortage actually exists, as the business groups claim, or whether companies would rather hire foreign workers at lower cost than recruit across a more broad swath of the US, or increase wages to attract Americans.

Our national policy is not that employers should be able to hire workers at whatever wage they choose to offer, even if that means recruiting from abroad," Ross Eisenbrey, vice president of think tank Economic Policy Institute, said in remarks prepared this week for a Wednesday hearing before a House of Representatives subcommittee.

At the hearing, congressmen of both parties from Maryland, Michigan and New York called for the programme to be expanded, saying their districts' economic wellbeing depends on the ability to recruit foreign workers.

Many landscaping businesses, resorts, restaurants, carnivals, seafood processing and other seasonal businesses are facing significant labour shortages this year," said Democrat Bart Stupak of Michigan, who has introduced legislation that would allow workers granted an H-2B visa to return the following year without counting against the national cap.

One of the most powerful unions in the nation, the AFL-CIO, maintains foreign workers recruited under the visa programme are subject to exploitation by unscrupulous recruiters and employers, and said the annual influx of foreigners drives down wages for US workers. Many employers find guest workers advantageous precisely because they will work for far lower wages and benefits than other US workers," union president John Sweeney said in a statement.

President George Bush and a bi-partisan Senate coalition sought last year to overhaul the immigration system and create a guest worker programme and a path to legal status for undocumented aliens. The push met fierce resistance from conservative Republicans who responded to an outcry among the party rank-and-file over what they viewed as an invasion of foreign workers.

Among the presidential candidates, Democrats Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama supported the bill, while Republican nominee John McCain did not vote on the measure.

The three presidential candidates have shown they are willing, in varying degrees, to consider what's known as comprehensive immigration reform, the combination of enhanced border security and some sort of path to legal status for undocumented workers. McCain, an Arizona senator, was an early proponent in his party of that approach, but has pulled back since his current run for president. He now says that securing the US borders is the most pressing part of the immigration issue.

Clinton, a New York senator, opposes a guest worker program that "exploits workers and creates a supply of cheap labour that undermines the wages of US workers," but it's unclear whether that includes the H-2B visa programme. Her campaign did not immediately return a call seeking comment. Obama, a senator from Illinois, has called for increasing the number of people allowed into the country to meet "the demand for jobs that employers cannot fill."

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