CANBERRA, March 16 – Australia will cut immigration for the first time in a decade, with recession looming and unemployment rising sharply, Immigration Minister Chris Evans said on Monday.
“We’re going to cut it from 133,500 to 115,000, so that’s about a 14 per cent cut,” Evans told state radio. “We don’t want people coming in who are going to compete with Australians for limited jobs.”
Australia’s jobless rate spiked to 5.2 per cent from 4.8 per cent last month with the biggest impact felt by full-time workers. The centre-left government expects unemployment to reach 7 per cent by mid-2010, although some economists fear it could go as high as 10 per cent.
Evans, who removed hairdressers and cooks off Australia’s critical occupation shortage list at Christmas, said he was now adding foreign bricklayers, plumbers, carpenters and electricians from the list that guides skilled migration intake.
Further cuts were likely in the May 12 budget, local media said, leaving only health occupations, engineering and information technology skills as needed skills.
“What we’ll look to do is run a smaller programme and keep the capacity to make sure we can bring in any labour we might need as the year develops,” Evans said.
Australia is a nation of immigrants and has been enjoying a boom in new arrivals for the past decade to help meet labour shortages as a China-fuelled mining boom drove unemployment rates to 30-year lows.
But six of Australia’s major trading partners are now in recession and economic growth has stalled. The country moved a step closer to recession this month with the first contraction in eight years and the economy shrinking by 0.5 per cent.
The government hopes its recently announced A$42 billion ($27.5 billion) stimulus package, including cash handouts and infrastructure spending, will help the economy weather a downturn.
But the Australian Chamber of Commerce and Industry said the government needed to be wary of tinkering with immigration, as many skilled areas still faced a shortage of workers.
“We would have preferred a status quo position,” chamber Chief Executive Peter Anderson said.
About one in four of Australia’s 21 million people were born overseas, and Australia has been actively trying to attract skilled workers, with immigration fairs targeting university graduates and people with trades in Europe, Britain and India.
Australia’s planned immigration intake has increased every year since 1997, although the number actually settling in Australia fell by about 20,000 in 2001-02.
Australia has accepted nearly 7 million immigrants since the end of World War Two. – Reuters
Err..ok! We come over and we still have to buy your food, buy your products, spend money on schools and facilities, contribute to super and all and even pay taxes! Doesn't that count for something?
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