February 6, 2012 –
Good news for overseas workers interested to work in Australia and apply for working visa Australia!
The Australian government just recently admitted a shortfall of 92,000 workers by 2015.
According to federal Tourism Minister Martin Ferguson, due to Australia’s hospitality and tourism industry being so short-staffed, the Australian government is now discussing importing 36,000 cooks, waiters, hotel managers, bartenders, and other skilled workers under a
new work visa Australia agreement to fill vacancies; with another 56,000 needed by 2015, according to Immigration Minister Chris Bowen.
The vacancies are caused by a number of factors; chief amongst which is the reluctance of Australians to do “menial” jobs, as well as Australians moving from the hospitality industry into higher paying mining and resources jobs. Experts say that due to the fact that mining jobs are high-paying, these have lured young Australian workers from traditional fields such as retail and hospitality, while others would rather go on the dole than do certain jobs themselves. However, with the tourism industry responsible for $35 billion worth of annual income to Australia, the government needs to act quickly to address the situation, particularly in regional areas.
Immigration Minister Chris Bowen stated that a template labor agreement will be developed to help to ease labor and skills pressures by improving the ability of the tourism and hospitality industry to attract and retain labor in some of the occupations identified by the industry as being in critical shortage.
Under a new federal plan, tourism and hospitality employers would be allowed to bring in workers on a two to three year Australian work visa similar to the 457 Australia working visa program widely used in the mining sector. This agreement would cover waiters, chefs, bar attendants, hotel managers, and other occupations which are hard to fill locally and are identified by the industry as being in critical shortage, or may be ineligible under other
Australia skilled visa migration programs.
Mr. Bowen further said that Australian employers would need to demonstrate they are doing their best to employ and train domestic workers and paying market rates in order to participate in the new agreement. Once approved to participate, employers would now be able to nominate workers for temporary skilled subclass 457 Australian working visa using the template, enabling workers to be granted Australian skilled visa where they meet the requirements.
It has been noted that there is a black market of illegal workers that extend across businesses including restaurants and general laboring.While hospitality is only one of a number of areas experiencing a lack of Australian workers struggling to fill vacancies, some sectors are being shunned altogether.