Irish Echo News

The number of 457 sponsorship visas being granted to Irish nationals has plateaued as the jobs market tightens up due to the global financial crisis.

Latest figures released by the Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC) show that while the overall numbers of 457 visas issues to Irish nationals is up on last year, the trend is down since Christmas.

A total of 1,790 employer-sponsored 457 visas were issued to Irish passport holders in the nine months to March 2009. This represents a 30 per cent increase on the 1,370 issued during the same period last year.

But for the first three months of 2009 the number of 457 visa grants is down slightly, from 520 in 2008 to 510 this year.

Total applications for the 457 visas have been trending downward – onshore and offshore – since September 2008 in response to the slowing economy.

Applications lodged in March 2009 are at the lowest rate since July 2006. The number of primary applications lodged in March 2009 was 33 per cent lower than those received in September 2008.

The overall number of visa grants has also fallen. The number of Subclass 457 primary visa grants in March 2009 was 53 per cent lower than those granted in September 2008.

The number of 457 primary visa grants in March 2009 was almost 35 per cent lower than those in February 2009.

Sydney-based migration agent John McQuaid says the figures are not surprising.

 “We were expecting that the figures for the last few months would drop off. The Department has been a lot stricter on applications and a lot of them are being refused.

“It’s not just that a lot of them are being refused, it’s the fact that those refusals are putting other people off applying because they don’t think they can get through under the stricter criteria. So in that regard application levels are down as well,” he said.

“The Department has really been clamping down in the past few months. There was a big political move to reduce the number of 457s granted and we’re seeing that now. They’re finding reasons to turn down applications a lot more.

“It’s not that they’ve changed their policies or anything like that, they’re just enforcing their own existing rules a lot more stringently.

“People are being refused visas who might have been granted this time six months ago, and that, in its own way, is putting off other people from applying at all.

 “Trades people in particular are being looked at a lot more closely, and they really need to be careful.”

Mr McQuaid says that employers are being dissuaded from sponsoring because of the tougher rules.

“A lot of companies are reading about how much harder it is to get a sponsorship through and a lot of them are just not bothering because they don’t think it’s worth the hassle.

“It seems the main changes are in the area of wages and training. It’s now more important to demonstrate that you’re paying or being paid above the average wage for your profession and that your company hasn’t made anyone redundant recently and are providing training to Australians.

“It will eventually relax again, but in the current climate, it’s important for the Government to demonstrate a vigorous approach to immigration.”

by Aaron Dunne