Banks and some business leaders have warned thatwith Australia now at its lowest unemployment rate in 50 years — 3.9% — business investment, performance, and growthwill be severely hampered by critical skilled and unskilled labour shortages in a market already lacking migrant workers.

NAB Chief Executive Ross McEwansaid directly thatthe Labor government’s most urgent task is to restore migration levels to ease the labour shortage.NAB itself is working to fill 700 skilled vacancies.

JBS, Australia’s largest meat and food processor, is also facing significant staffing shortages that are affecting its operations in Australia and globally.

CEO Brent EastwoodThey noted that Australia’s skilled workforce is ageing and it is becoming increasingly difficult to attract young workers,so we depend on migration.JBS will continue training skilled and semi-skilled workers,but some operations simply need people — people who need to be there. Right now, those people don’t exist.

During the election campaign, both the Coalition and Labor were reluctant to discuss increasing migration numbers (specifically the annual PR grant quota).But the Labor government must now adopt a bigger Australia policy, including pursuing migration to reach the employment peak Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has spoken about.A migration programme designed to address labour market bottlenecks should be a prerequisite for the government to deliver on its election promises to fight inflation and reduce the cost of living,and the new government simply cannot wait months to act.Swift action is needed, alongside a significant reduction in the current lengthy visa processing times.

Overall, Prime Minister Albanese needs to seize the opportunity presented by the new government and actively recruit the world’s best talent to come to Australia.

After the Labor government confirmed its election win,the NSW and Victorian Premiersstatedthey would work with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese urgently to address the critical skilled worker shortages affecting their states, with education, healthcare, and construction identified as the hardest-hit industries.

Skilled migration visa processing times are now so lengthy that they are partly causing NSW and Victorian employers to face severe labour shortfalls.

The NSW Premier said: “Last night I spoke with the Victorian Premier about this issue,and we will work closely with the Prime Minister to resolve it — and it needs to be resolved quickly. We can’t wait.The feedback I’m receiving is that their visa applications are taking 18 months to process. This needs to be fixed, and it needs to be fixed fast.”

He said he had already had a constructive conversation with the Prime Minister and confirmed that Victoria is on the same page.The Victorian government’s official response indicated its willingness to work with the federal government to address the skills shortage.

The Premier emphasised that his call was not simply about increasing migration numbers,but about enabling skilled migrants overseas to enter Australia quickly in a targeted manner.

After hearing both Premiers speak out,multiple industries swiftly joined in their support!

A serious recommendation:

not simply an increase, but strategic reform

Chief Economist of the Committee for the Economic Development of Australia (CEDA), Jarrod Ball,said revitalising Australia’s post-pandemic migration systemrequires a focused, deliberate, and sustained strategy,rather than a stumbling attempt to limp back to pre-pandemic levels.

CEDA’s recent survey of chief financial officers found thatnearly 70% of respondents considered access to appropriately skilled workers over the next 12 months to be highly important in driving their investment decisions.

But the impact extends beyond the labour market — it also represents a risk of Australia failing to compete in the global war for talent. As baby boomers retire around the world, this global talent competition will only intensify.The number of Australians intending to retire in the next 12 months is at its highest level in 20 years. Australia needs to attract more global talent to reinvigorate productivity growth.

Australia’s pandemic border controls were among the strictest of any country,and in the early stages, the government was slower than other nations in providing emergency assistance to temporary migrants already onshore.Canada was ahead of the curve, loudly announcing a target of 400,000 new permanent residents in 2021— and while in practice most of the benefit went to those already in Canada, the positive signal sent to prospective migrants was loud and clear.

(At the time, this had a significant impact on applicants who were stuck in a very difficult situation in Australia.)

So the signals Australia sends to the rest of the world on migration matter enormously.Incoming Immigration Minister Andrew Giles should begin by publicly outlining the government’s strategic migration priorities for the coming parliament.

Jarrod Ball’s own view is that if Australia is to build a sustainable and competitive approach,the Labor government must have at least four priorities:

Priority one: getting skills matching right

Priority two: faster visa pathways

Priority three: better permanent residency pathways

Priority four: better system governance

Priority one: getting skills matching right

23% of Australia’s permanent skilled migrants end up working below their skill level. This mismatch decreases when employers are involved in the recruitment process.Jarrod Ball’s recommendation:

In the short term,the skilled temporary and permanent migration system should be better aligned with skills demand through an overhaul of the skilled occupation classification lists,to better reflect the contemporary labour market.

In the longer term, introduce a skills-matching platform accessible to both employers and incoming migrants. This would likely be a better long-term solutionthan pushing hard to significantly raise the minimum income threshold for temporary visa holders(this appears to refer to the $53,900 threshold, which primarily affects employer-sponsored and Subclass 491 visa holders).While the minimum income threshold is long overdue for an increase, going too far and moving too aggressively would worsen the labour shortage.

He also mentioned the recent recommendations from the Joint Standing Committee on Migration,including introducing an intra-company transfer visato ensure that trusted multinational companies can more quickly access the talent they need here in Australia.

Priority two and three: faster visa pathways and better permanent residency pathways

Having better and clearer pathways to permanent residency, and making the visa process faster and simpler,is critically important for prospective migrants. People considering migration place great value on certainty and are hesitant to move to a country that does not offer a clear path to permanent residency. The government also needs to recognise that Australia’s population challenges and critical skills needs will not disappear any time soon.

Priority four: better system governance

This essentially comes down to internal operational processes.The management of the Australian migration system also needs to be modernised to meet post-pandemic migration challenges. Jarrod Ball said more timely and transparent system performance data, along with more efficient processing data, would be an excellent starting point.

Finally, Jarrod Ball said the current government must firmly place migration on its post-election policy agenda. The future standard of living for all Australians depends on it.

The Home Affairs Ministeris one of the record ten women in cabinet — born in the 1980sClare O’Neiland in a speech at the National Press Club in late 2020, publicly called for a sweeping overhaul of migration as part of major post-pandemic reform.

She said that over the past 15 years, the number of non-skilled migrants had doubled to 800,000, while temporary skilled migrants pushed that figure close to 1,000,000.Yet what Australia needs is to make key changes that allow more skilled permanent migrants to enter,to drive growth in manufacturing, science, and technology — regardless of where those migrants come from.

Australia needs to undergo an economic transformation, and migration can help us achieve that — but it won’t happen if we revert to the old ways.

Immigration Minister Andrew Gileswas previously the Shadow Minister Assisting for Immigration and Citizenship, so the appointment is at least logically consistent from a portfolio perspective. In March 2021, he raised in parliamenta call for the then-governing Coalition to propose a fairer and more decent migration policy.He said:

Modern Australia is built on migration, and multiculturalism is one of its foundations.He also criticised the Morrison government for ‘abandoning’ temporary migrants at the onset of the pandemic (in the early days of COVID-19, there was very little support for temporary migrants such as international students — the message was essentially ‘if you can’t make ends meet in Australia, go home’),which in reality constituted a loss for temporary migrants and a loss for this country.

Migration information and Q&A group