The need for staff in residential aged care facilities increases, be it Registered Nurses or personal care workers, and the Federal Government’s announcement has added 22 occupations to its Priority Migration Skilled Occupation List raising hopes.
However, Immigration, Citizenship, Migrant Services and Multicultural Affairs Minister Alex Hawke’s announcement fell flat.
Here is the updated Priority Migration Skilled Occupation List.
The 41 occupations (ANZSCO code) are:
- Chief Executive or Managing Director (111111)
- Construction Project Manager (133111)
- Accountant (General) (221111)*
- Management Accountant (221112)*
- Taxation Accountant (221113)*
- External Auditor (221213)*
- Internal Auditor (221214)*
- Surveyor (232212)*
- Cartographer (232213)*
- Other Spatial Scientist (232214)*
- Civil Engineer (233211)*
- Geotechnical Engineer (233212)*
- Structural Engineer (233214)*
- Transport Engineer (233215)*
- Electrical Engineer (233311)*
- Mechanical Engineer (233512)
- Mining Engineer (excluding Petroleum) (233611)*
- Petroleum Engineer (233612)*
- Medical Laboratory Scientist (234611)*
- Veterinarian (234711)
- Orthotist or Prosthetist (251912)*
- General Practitioner (253111)
- Resident Medical Officer (253112)
- Psychiatrist (253411)
- Medical Practitioners nec (253999)
- Midwife (254111)
- Registered Nurse (Aged Care) (254412)
- Registered Nurse (Critical Care and Emergency) (254415)
- Registered Nurse (Medical) (254418)
- Registered Nurse (Mental Health) (254422)
- Registered Nurse (Perioperative) (254423)
- Registered Nurses nec (254499)
- Multimedia Specialist (261211)*
- Analyst Programmer (261311)*
- Developer Programmer (261312)
- Software Engineer (261313)
- Software and Applications Programmers nec (261399)*
- ICT Security Specialist (262112)*
- Social Worker (272511)
- Maintenance Planner (312911)
- Chef (351311)*
* Indicates occupation added in June 2021. Only from the USA, Canada, UK and some parts of South Africa.
“Government has received valuable feedback from Australian business stakeholders on critical skill vacancies, which has been considered together with data from the National Skills Commission, in order to develop today's update to the Priority Migration Skilled Migration List," Mr Hawke said.
The need for Registered Nurses (Aged Care) was on the first list issued in September last year and is retained and is clearly in need. There is no mention of aged care workers or personal care assistants, which the industry is absolutely crying out for.
Operators would be happy to take migrants from Nepal, Thailand, the Philippines and other parts of Asia and train them locally, which has been widespread in the past. With the borders closed that is just not going to happen.
