The Minister for Immigration and Citizenship, Chris Evans, has today announced further changes to Australia’s existing migration program, aimed at targeting key areas of skills shortage.

Details of the key changes announced today by the Minister are:

1. Abolition of the Migration Occupations in Demand List (MODL) and gradual phasing out of the Critical Skills List. Importantly this does not affect applications which are before the Department. However, applicants under the Employer Nomination Scheme who are subject to exceptional circumstances due to a range of factors including age and English language ability should contact their InterStaff consultant to discuss.
2. The capping of visa places for Offshore General Skilled Migration applications that were made prior to September 2007. Once the cap is reached the Minister has announced remaining applications under that criteria will be returned unprocessed as ineligible. The Minister has noted that application fees may be refundable to applicants
3. Top priority to employer sponsored migration remains a key plank of the Government’s migration program.

Today’s changes were not the only announcements that the Minister made in relation to revamping the skilled migration program. He foreshadowed another round of changes due to be released mid 2010 including:

1. Caps and limits on particular visa occupations;
2. A new skills list will be prepared by Skills Australia and released mid 2010 (due by end April 2010). It is clear that many of the 106 occupations currently on the MODL will not be part of the new arrangements.
3. A review of the points test for skilled migration.
4. The States and Territories are invited to develop and submit State Migration Plans which may include occupations outside of the national list of occupations. At the date of the announcement, there were no approved State Migration Programs.

As Minister for Immigration, Chris Evans has steadily moved towards a program similar to the NZ model of migration that is strongly linked to employment prospects and job readiness.

Such a program is likely to be more responsive to market changes than a list-based system and in that context should be supported by the industry.

Source : http://www.interstaff.com/2010/02/migration-shakeup-announced.php

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