Issue/Related Articles on 457 Visa grant in Australia

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What is a 457 visa?

Updated Thu Mar 14, 2013 11:21am AEDT
MAP: Australia
Prime Minister Julia Gillard has described the 457 skilled migrant worker visa program as "riddled with rorts".
Ms Gillard has announced a crackdown on the rorts, saying she wants to stop foreigners being at the front of the jobs queue with Australians at the back.
The Coalition and some business groups have accused her of demonising foreigners.
But just what is the 457 visa?
The 457 visa is the most common way for employers to temporarily sponsor skilled overseas workers to work in Australia .
Holders of the visa may be employed for a period of between three months and four years.
They may bring any eligible family members to Australia, and those family members have unrestricted work and study rights.
AUDIO: PM meets a 457 visa holder (PM)
Visa holders are restricted to working for their sponsor and may not work or volunteer for any other organisation.
They must also meet minimum levels of qualifications and English language skills, in addition to health and character requirements.
As of January this year there were around 105,000 457 visa holders in Australia - an increase of 22.4 per cent since January 2012.
Almost two-thirds of those people have a university degree or a post-graduate qualification.
Their average wage is close to $90,000 a year.
The program is uncapped and driven by employer demand.
This generally means employers will sponsor overseas workers more in times of high economic growth and low unemployment
It is common for 457 visa holders to apply for permanent residency status in Australia.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-03-14/what-is-a-457-visa/4572368

PM accused of using rubbery figures in 457 visa fight

Prime Minister Julia Gillard is being accused of using rubbery figures to justify her call for a crackdown on 457 visa rorts.
On Thursday Ms Gillard told an Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) conference that temporary overseas work was growing faster than employment.
She said temporary overseas worker numbers were up 20 per cent compared with the same time last year, whereas employment growth for the period was only 1 per cent.
"That in itself is evidence of a problem," she said.
"The number of people coming here to fill short-term gaps should not be growing 20 times faster than employment overall."
But demographer and government adviser Peter McDonald says the Prime Minister's statement does not bear scrutiny.
He says that is because the retirement of baby boomers means Australia starts each year 140,000 workers short.
457 visa numbers
2011-12 - 125,070
2009-10 - 67,980
2007-08 - 110,570
2003-04 - 39,500
"If the labour force grows by 1 per cent as the Prime Minister says, that's about 120,000 [people]," he said.
"So we take the 120,000 growth, 140,000 we have to make up, [making a] combined 260,000 new workers that we have to get into the labour force, and 457s make up about 40,000 of that.
"I think the way the Prime Minister expressed it about growth rates, not using numbers, was really statistically misleading."
Immigration Minister Brendan O'Connor says Mr McDonald's comments are wrong and irrelevant.
"The Government is perfectly correct in saying the total 457 issues has vastly outstripped total employment growth, but the total figures really aren't the point of our reforms," he said.
"The Government doesn't think all 457s are rorts, the Government thinks there are problems with particular firms and particular occupations."

What is a 457 visa? Read our explainer

The ABC has confirmed that no-one in the bureaucracy is driving the Government's push against 457 visas.
On the contrary, the Immigration Department issued a statement in February saying falling demand since last June showed the program was responding well to economic needs.
But Ms Gillard sees it differently.
"457s are a gap filler for our skills-poor economy at times and places of highest need. Yet that is simply not what is happening today and that is why we must fix it," she told the union summit.
The Prime Minister talked about health workers, for example, in I think quite a nasty way. The health workers that she's [talking about are] highly skilled health workers, many of them working in regional areas, the only doctor for miles, the only pharmacist for miles.

Government adviser Peter McDonald

Ms Gillard also said it was unacceptable that too many temporary overseas workers were filling health jobs and that local workers were missing out.
She said tighter requirements on visa applicants and employers would address that.
"Most striking of all is the widespread use of temporary skilled labour in hospitals and health," she said.
But Mr McDonald says "nasty" comments like that undermine the system.
"The Prime Minister talked about health workers, for example, in I think quite a nasty way," he said.
"The health workers that she's [talking about are] highly skilled health workers, many of them working in regional areas, the only doctor for miles, the only pharmacist for miles.
"And she's telling them that they've been given the priority whereas Australians have to clean the toilets or work cleaning the hospitals, etc.
"I think that's pretty nasty stuff."

We asked if you agreed that the debate over 457 workers had turned nasty. Read your comments.

'Just not acceptable'

Ms Gillard also said too many overseas workers were filling jobs in Australia's Information Technology industry.
"It's just not acceptable that information technology jobs, the quintessential jobs of the future, the very opportunities being created by the digital economy, precisely where the big picture is for our kids, that such an area as this should be such a big area for imported skills," she told the summit.
But experts in both migration and computing have told 7.30 there is an information technology skills shortage.
Migration Institute of Australia chief executive Maureen Horder says IT is still a growth area.
"That's one of the growth areas, technology. So it's not surprising that we would be looking to broaden the skill base in Australia in that particular sector," she said.
Australian Computer Society figures show that since 2003, the number of jobs in IT has grown by 100,000, or 31 per cent, with 12,000 new jobs created last year.
But figures show from 2003 to 2010 the number of domestic Information and Communication Technology students halved, from 9,093 to 4,293.
In fact, domestic students in Australian IT courses are outnumbered by foreign students by two to one.
Demand for particular skills is so acute in some areas that it takes 247 days to fill a job.
The ACTU has continued to support the Government's moves to tighten the rules on 457 visas.
"I know there's a lot of people out there who want to turn this around into just being a migration issue," ACTU secretary Dave Oliver said.
"It is not. This is about an employment issue.
"This is an issue which is about opportunity.
"It's opportunity for local workers to be employed, it's opportunity for existing workers to be trained up."
Surprise job growth

VIDEO: Record number of jobs created (Lateline)

Meanwhile, Bureau of Statistics figures released on Thursday showed a shock increase of 71,500 jobs in February, leaving unemployment steady at 5.4 per cent.

That is the largest monthly rise in the Bureau of Statistics estimates of job creation in almost 13 years, since July 2000.
According to the ABS labour force survey, most of the jobs were part-time (53,700), but 17,800 full-time jobs were added as well.
Economists surveyed by Reuters had on average expected only 9,000 jobs to be added in total and unemployment to tick up to 5.5 per cent.
The positive results were reinforced by a rise in the proportion of the population in work or looking for it to 65.3 per cent, up from 65 per cent, in a sign that some discouraged job seekers are again looking for jobs.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-03-14/gillard-accused-of-misrepresenting-457-visa-figures/4574048#comments