Australian immigration changes

Australia is a place where laws and policies are updated frequently. No policy changes more frequently than the immigration policy. With the latest update, only people with specific and select experience can hope to get a permanent residence in Australia.

Carla and I have been following Australian immigration policy for the last couple of years. It is truly surprising to see how often they tweak this policy. So far this year, there have been three major changes to the immigration policy, with at least one more change to come this year.

First, the number of immigrants that Australia accepts was cut by 20%. Then, the immigration department cut a number of positions off the list of eligible professions for immigration purposes. Two weeks ago, a priority queuing system was introduced to help eliminate the large number of immigration applications. Later this year, more professions are supposed to be cut from the eligibility list and the English language requirement is about to be made tougher.

The recently introduced priority queuing system makes it pretty much impossible to immigrate to Australia without a profession that is not on the Australian Critical Skills List (CSL). Majority of the professions on the CSL are medical professionals, engineers, teachers, accountants and computer professionals. Everyone else not on the list, don't bother applying because your application will be processed in three years or so.

That means that I need twelve months of recent (within the last 24 months) experience in a CSL profession to be able to apply for permanent residence. I need to get this experience before Carla's student visa runs out in three years. No pressure! :-)