LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

The Minister of Immigration has announced changes to the skilled migration system to cater for the long term skill shortage in Australia and at the same time, he is addressing the issues arising from the flow of overseas students. The changes announced by him will favour people working in the industry who have a good command of English. The new changes will affect two groups of people. Offshore GSM applications lodged before September 1, 2008 and overseas students seeking extension of their stay in Australia, on completing their post qualification. A new skill occupation list will be announced from mid-2010 and the MODL list has been removed altogether. This will have no impact on overseas students as the list has been removed completely without discrimination to any particular skill or group of people. It has also been announced that a new SOL will continue to be adjusted in future to meet the labour demand. Therefore students should not rush into changing courses upon the announcement of the new list, as there is no guarantee that the SOL announced in mid-2010 will not change by the time they are eligible for PR. The new laws will work in the favour of meeting skill shortages in key areas in Australia. At the same time, students will still be able to come to Australia to study and enhance their chances of employment. It will also encourage students to seek employment in their related area of study.

In the long run this policy will benefit those students who are serious about their studies and would like to gain an Australian qualification. My advice to the students even before this policy was announced was always to seek employment in the trade they are studying and improve on their English language skills. Let’s say that even if the trade which they study is removed from the new SOL, so long as they are working in the industry they can get a visa under the employer nominated schemes. For example, the hospitality industry is still predicting skill shortages and there are ample jobs for the right candidates.

Paramjit Jaswal CEO Imperial College of Technology and Management Melbourne

The new changes of withdrawing most vocational trades, including hairdressing, cookery, plumbing, welding and carpentry from its skills priority list, apart from the proposal to remove cookery and hairdressing from the list of occupational skills in short supply, is a step that will have widespread ramifications for the 15-billiondollar international education industry of Australia.

Hairdressing and cookery are popular courses amongst Indian students as extra migration points allowed a “fast track” to their residency in Australia.

Victoria’s largest intake of overseas students is from India. The news of the changes has immediately impacted on our Education industry, reflected by a drop of more than 50 per cent enrolment of student numbers from India.

In contrast, for the year to July 2009,