AUSTRALIA: Australia will increase its permanent immigration numbers by 35,000 to 195,000 in the current fiscal year as it tries to refocus its attention on long-term migrants, offering some relief to businesses facing severe worker shortages.
Job Summit and the role of migration in Australia
During the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic, Australia closed its borders for about two years. Still, rigorous regulations and the outflow of tourists and international students made it difficult for businesses to retain employees and stay viable.
“We are being given an opportunity to change the immigration system by COVID that we will never get back. I want to take that chance with you,” Home Affairs Minister Clare O’Neil told a government jobs summit on Friday.
“Based on projections, this could mean thousands more nurses settling in the country this year, thousands more engineers.”
Australia’s unemployment rate is currently 3.4%, which is close to a 50-year low, but rising inflation means real wages are declining.
Businesses have been pressuring the government to increase the annual immigration ceiling from 160,000, which has prompted it to adopt temporary modifications to satisfy the labour shortage.
The freshly elected centre-left Labour government organised the two-day summit in Canberra, the nation’s capital, which invited business associations and labour unions to assist in finding solutions to pressing economic problems.
As many nations want to relax immigration laws, Australia has been competing with other established economies to get more talented workers from outside.
However, the staff shortage situation has worsened due to a blowout in visa processing delays in Australia, which has left about a million potential employees in limbo.
Immigration Minister Andrew Giles told the summit, “We understand that when people wait and wait, the uncertainty can become unmanageable. This is not acceptable and reflects the crisis that the visa system has been experiencing.”
“Immigration is about nation building. Central to this is the manner in which people are welcomed after they’ve made the decision to call Australia home. My focus is about listening to and working with the millions of Australians who are our immigrant story,” he tweeted.
Giles announced that the government would invest A$36.1 million ($25 million) to increase its staff capacity by 500 workers over the next nine months to speed up the visa application process.
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