WA Premier, Mark McGowan, has signaled that unlike his federal Labor counterpart, Bill Shorten, he actually cares about his workers.
With WA unemployment and underemployment sky high:
McGowan in March wrote to Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull to remove Perth from the Regional Sponsorship Migration Scheme, thus effectively preventing a pathway for overseas workers to gain a visa:
Today, The West Australian reports that the State Government has released an updated version of the WA skilled migration list, slashing it to just 18 eligible occupations from 178 previously:
The list, which used to carry 178 occupations including bricklayers, engineers and nurses, was torn up on Labor’s first day of government in March.
Premier Mark McGowan said the 18 occupations on the list were mainly in the health sector where there was a genuine need, including midwives, psychiatrists and several classes of registered nurses.
Mr McGowan said in the current economic climate it did not make sense to give jobs to migrants ahead of West Australians.
“In the current economic climate, it’s more important than ever that we maximise employment opportunities for Western Australians,” he said.
“Our policy will ensure that, whenever possible, Western Australians will be given first preference on WA jobs. It doesn’t make sense to fast-track workers from overseas when there are unemployed Western Australians who are capable of doing the work…
Mr McGowan also confirmed the Federal Government agreed to remove Perth as a region from the regional sponsored migration scheme, which provided an additional pathway to obtain a visa to work on WA.
Rather than labeling anyone wanting a reduction in Australia’s world-leading immigration program “political extremists”, Labor leader Bill Shorten should instead be following the lead of Premier Mark McGowan and cracking down on the myriad of visa rorts and record high permanent skilled migration that is depriving Australians of job opportunities and clogging our major cities.
With Australian labour underutilisation running at 14.5%, and youth underutisation running 31.3%:
And average employee earnings falling:
There is simply no justification for running such high levels of temporary and permanent immigration and devaluing Australian workers in the process.
