Skilled migration to ACT drops as workforce shortages persist

Minister for Skills Chris Steel told an annual reports hearing on Monday that some migrants were already in Australia and able to take advantage of the various skilled migration programs.

"[Skilled migration is] something we're looking at closely in terms of skills shortages," Mr Steel said.

In 2019-20 and 2020-21, only 9 per cent of applicants came from overseas and 69 per cent were interstate graduates coming to Canberra.

In the previous financial year the territory was able to nominate up to 1400 applicants for the 190 skilled nominated visa and the 491 provisional visa.

The top five countries where skilled migrants originated from were India, Nepal, China, Pakistan and Bhutan.

The top occupations for skilled migrants included accountant, registered nurse, civil engineer and information technology systems analyst. Employers are being surveyed for the new list of critical skills from July 1.

Mr Steel said aged care, disability care, early childhood education and industries requiring digital skills were facing workforce shortages.

The JobTrainer program, designed to offer free courses in areas of skills shortages during the pandemic, had provided 2731 places in the first phase and 149 places in November last year.

Out of the JobTrainer enrolments, 58 per cent were women, 2.8 per cent were Indigenous, 17 per cent had a disability, 44 per cent were job seekers and 48 per cent were people aged 18 to 24.

READ MORE:

Mr Steel was asked why CIT received 75 per cent of JobTrainer funding but 80 per cent of students attend private training organisations.

"We are strongly of the belief that public TAFE is the foundation of that system in the ACT," he said.

He said the second iteration of the JobTrainer program would allow more private training providers to deliver courses.

Mr Steel said the ACT government was in negotiations with the federal government regarding funding for CIT.

"We will not tolerate cuts to public TAFE providers and increase in fees for public TAFE students."

A survey of 300 CIT students who did not complete their course found 86 per cent dropped out due to their family life and change in employment.

CIT chief executive Leanne Cover said it was too early to see the impact of the free JobTrainer courses.

"We are seeing signs of recovery after COVID and there is lots of interest in those courses the government has supplemented."

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content: