Suspension of General Skilled Migration

[clan mac]

Have just returned home after spending a lovely weekend in the sun at our caravan. My eyeballs nearly popped out of their sockets when I read this thread and the responses. My instinctive optimist want to think 'that good thing come to those who wait', but I can't help feeling gutted for all the people who have already jumped through so many hoops to try to get their applications ready before July 1st. We are only at the stage of having just submitted the paperwork bit to vetassess so would not in reality be applying before July 2010. It doesn't stop me feeling gutted for the people whose dreams may have been dashed though. Maybe we will be rewarded for our patience? (there goes my inner optimist again!) and the new SOL may herald pleasant surprises - who knows?? One thing is for sure we have no choice now but to wait it out and hope for good news. GOOD LUCK TO EVERYONE

 

Clan Mac

[Guest bristow1]

Hi does this mean my visa has been binned? Im a carpenter/joiner my skilled 175 visa was lodged last october, we still havent heard anything!

[virtual_bajwa]

On the non csl 176 thread...We have just had a post by a PIO member stating that they have been told that even applications 'in the system' will not be processed until June (which, I appreciate isnt far away....

But to be honest, I cant trust that more changes/delays wont be implemented before then...:frown:)

 

Yes guys,

this is what I was talking about. Nothing is going to happen till new Govt. take over. This Govt. purely eyeing at elections. So this is the only reason why they have suspended new GSM applications. I will not be surprised if they announce some more changes in coming weeks.But on the other other side of coin DIAC is always unpredictable so they can pull something out of hat...So wait and watch. This is an opera show going on. Some tears in eyes and some fun ..

[George Lombard]

For those waiting for developments I think it's clear that nothing can be expected before the Federal Budget tomorrow night - there should be reams of documentation online from 8.30pm and hopefully some useful detail there, for example the new SOL.

 

Cheers,

 

George Lombard

[imaxx]

On the non csl 176 thread...We have just had a post by a PIO member stating that they have been told that even applications 'in the system' will not be processed until June (which, I appreciate isnt far away....

But to be honest, I cant trust that more changes/delays wont be implemented before then...:frown:)

 

:huh::huh: i am at a loss for words. i submitted the requirements asked for by my CO in April. I emailed my CO last week to followup (as suggested by the operator of DIAC) but i never got anything, not even an auto reply :cry::no::cry::no:

 

i thought it was only the acceptance of new applications that was on hold, not the processing of those in the pipeline :shocked:

[Guest Gollywobbler]

:huh::huh: i am at a loss for words. i submitted the requirements asked for by my CO in April. I emailed my CO last week to followup (as suggested by the operator of DIAC) but i never got anything, not even an auto reply :cry::no::cry::no:

 

i thought it was only the acceptance of new applications that was on hold, not the processing of those in the pipeline :shocked:

 

Hi imaxx

 

You are correct. For the moment at any rate, nothing has been said that need worry you.

 

Cheers

 

Gill

[ponnuvarun]

Hi,

 

Last week I sent one PLE unfortunately no reply!! Today I called them as well. They confirmed that they are still processing applications and once the CSL is over they will start processing Category 5 applications.

 

Waiting... waiting and waiting..... Who knows whether they will remove our profession from the new SOL.....

 

If they are removing our profession from the new list... what will happen to existing applicants??

 

Satish

[John Gilfillan]

Hi,

 

Last week I sent one PLE unfortunately no reply!! Today I called them as well. They confirmed that they are still processing applications and once the CSL is over they will start processing Category 5 applications.

 

Waiting... waiting and waiting..... Who knows whether they will remove our profession from the new SOL.....

 

If they are removing our profession from the new list... what will happen to existing applicants??

 

Satish

 

 

Hi Satish,

 

Removal of your occupation from the new SOL should have no effect on your application. I have been told that existing applicants will not be affected.

I also think that this latest change will help clear the back log of existing applicants starting firstly with the CSL applicants and then on to 176 and 175.

 

 

John

[Rachael R]

My other half sprays cars and he is on the new list, We have done a 175 state sponerd visa for the south does this still mean us?:frown: Why is everything so heard!

[Guest Gollywobbler]

Hi John Gilfillan

 

I think that Friday's sudden announcement was a typical, knee-jerk reaction from the Minister for Immi.

 

DIAC evidently told him that there has been a sudden surge in new applications from people keen to beat the deadline of the to-be-changed SOL. That surge would obviously get bigger as soon as the new SOL is published.

 

I think the Minister panicked - as usual - and that it led to the hasty announcement on Friday.

 

The Minister has shot himself in the foot with his latest antics. Over on Poms in Adelaide, there are posts by Julia. Her husband Rich is an anaesthetist. He is quite young so he is a Registrar, not a Consultant. He is already in SA on a sc 457 visa but for some reason he cannot apply for employer-sponsored PR, so they decided to get a sc 176 visa instead.

 

In his wisdom, the Minister tried to slam the GSM door in their faces on Friday 7th May. If that isn't flamin' STUPID (and guaranteed to ensure that Rich will now consider the USA, Canada and NZ instead of putting up with any more nonsense from the Aussies) it is hard to imagine what would be stupid, methinks.

 

Cheers

 

Gill

[cartertucker]

On the non csl 176 thread...We have just had a post by a PIO member stating that they have been told that even applications 'in the system' will not be processed until June (which, I appreciate isnt far away....

But to be honest, I cant trust that more changes/delays wont be implemented before then...:frown:)

 

A visa has been granted today :wideeyed:(please see the non csl 176 thread)

 

So, at least we have proof they are (for now) still processing those in the system...:jiggy:

[rgrangana]

A visa has been granted today :wideeyed:(please see the non csl 176 thread)

 

So, at least we have proof they are (for now) still processing those in the system...:jiggy:

 

 

Currently they are processing CSL applications lodged around March 2010.( Hope small number of CSLs are yet to be finished). If Balance CSLs are finished during this suspension period, They can start processing Cat 5,6,& 7 simultaneously.

[tcillc]

A visa has been granted today :wideeyed:(please see the non csl 176 thread)

 

So, at least we have proof they are (for now) still processing those in the system...:jiggy:

 

Interesting!! Is their a way to find how much quota is left for the year?

[Ozzieland]

Currently they are processing CSL applications lodged around March 2010.( Hope small number of CSLs are yet to be finished). If Balance CSLs are finished during this suspension period, They can start processing Cat 5,6,& 7 simultaneously.

 

Hope so too... Anyway with the new rules effective 1st July, the priority list will change. I think this is probably the reason why they are trying to finish the CSL applications.

[Guest Gollywobbler]

Currently they are processing CSL applications lodged around March 2010.( Hope small number of CSLs are yet to be finished). If Balance CSLs are finished during this suspension period, They can start processing Cat 5,6,& 7 simultaneously.

 

Interesting!! Is their a way to find how much quota is left for the year?

 

Hi tcllic

 

I tried to get David Wilden to confirm how many GSM visas had been granted up till the end of December 2009 - DIAC's half year. Those figures were definitely available because they would definitely have been needed for the MInister's information. At the meeting with Mr Wilden on 30th November, one of the others had asked him for the GSM figures up to the end of November 2009.

 

At the meeting, Mr Wilden was completely open and honest about the figures. He thought that DIAC almost certainly compile the relevant figures at least once a month, agreed that there was no reason why these figures should not be made available to the public and he said he would get them for us from Australia.

 

No figures were forthcoming so I chased Mr Wilden about it in January 2010. By then, the half-year had passed and even if DIAC do not compile the detailed figures every month, they would definitely compile them at the end of the half-year.

 

Mr Wilden duly asked his colleagues in Australia. (David Wilden is an Aussie himself, for those who are new to Poms in Oz - he is DIAC's Regional Director for Europe, based at the Aussie High Commission in London.)

 

Mr Wilden then sent me a mealy-mouthed reply. Apparently Canberra had decided that it would be "too confusing" (or some similar rubbish) for a mere mortal to see their blasted figures, allegedly.

 

I was LIVID. I will decide how thick and confused I might be, for a start- not a bunch of patronising bloody Aussies in Canberra who have never even met me. In any case I would not have been even slightly confused either because however "confusing" the figures might have been, my plan was to get them and send them on to George Lombard and to Alan Collett of Go Matilda.

 

Alan Collett is a Chartered Accountant in England & Wales and also in Australia. I've never met an accountant who can't work out a set of figures, no matter how "confusing" they might be. George Lombard is a lawyer, not an accountant, but George is extremely beady and he would have a pretty good idea of what the figures should reveal by the end of a DIAC half-year, and so forth. He and Alan Collett know each other and between them, they also know dozens of other RMAs via the Migration Institute of Australia. I am not so goddamned stupid that I would not have had the figures fully and properly analysed by some experts who could then have explained them to everyone else.

 

For whatever reason, DIAC preferred to keep the half-yearly figures a secret and to keep them well away from the prying eyes of the public. This sort of stupidity gets their officials very short shrift in the end because people remember the fact that those officials have seen fit to insult an enquirer's intelligence.

 

However from somewhere, I did learn the following snippet:

 

Migration Program Statistics - Statistics - Publications, Research & Statistics

 

The 3 categories marked Skilled Independent, State/Territory Sponsored and Skilled Aussie Sponsored at the 3 that matter for GSM purposes. The total of the 3 is roughly 70,000. However, this does NOT mean 70,000 visas to 70,000 main applicants and the visas for their partners and children don't count. I am told that about 40,000 of the visas are earmarked for main applicants and the other 30,000 go to their partners, childen and any other dependants (eg an elderly parent who have lived with the migrating family for years etc.)

 

It follows that the number of GSM visas that are intended to be granted to main applicants is actually pretty small. It seems smaller still when you consider that this number caters for all GSM visas - both the onshore and the offshore visas. Add the fact that the Minister wants the 40,000 figure to fall because he wants the figure for employer sponsored PR visas to rise.

 

In November 2009, Peter Mares interviewed the Minister for Immi on the radio. (I know that you know about this tcllic but newcomers to PiO might not know about it.)

 

The National Interest - About

 

Immigration Minister responds to backlog concerns - The National Interest - 13 November 2009

 

In the interview, the Minister admitted that DIAC were sitting on applications for about 105,000 offshore GSM visas and about 30,000 applications for onshore GSM visas. People who have studied in Oz were eligible to apply for the offshore GSM visas as well as onshore ones. Allegedly a lot of the Students and ex-Students have applied for offshore GSM visas.

 

Whicever way you cut it, 145,000 / 40,000 is likely to take at least 4 years to clear. Fooling about with priorities will affect who gets to Oz first but it will have zero impact on the underlying problem of having far more GSM visa applications in hand than DIAC can process within a reasonably short timeframe.

 

The Minister has tried hinting that the sharp rise in International Student visas over the years has led directly to the GSM problem now. DIAC briefed against him at the MIA Conference in October 2009. DIAC officials at the Conference claimed that they saw this problem looming on the horizon in 2007 and that they warned both the previous and the present Governments that the GSM visa program would blow out during 2009.

 

Which has happened. With hindsight, it is pretty obvious that the Minister raised the allowable number of skilled visas to a total of 133,500 for 2008-2009 in order to try to tackle the GSM visa problem via allowing extra GSM visas each year. He then cut that number down to 108,500.

 

He says that he cut the number in response to the Global Financial Crisis. I don't believe that the GFC was solely to blame.

 

People can work the rest out by themselves and for themselves since we all have differing opinions about the real causes, or all of the causes, and about where to place the blame for the backlog.

 

Cheers

 

Gill

[Guest eddie]

Hi, not been on in a while, and after eading the replies to this latest piece of news, thought i'd like to comment.

 

I agree with Rachbarlow, about the "safety" of visas already applied for. The DIAC changes things so "randomly", that it does make you uneasy about applications already in the system. I know that once you have applied, your points etc are safe, but for how much longer?

The DIAC website, does say something about - no visa is guaranteed, and major lifestyle changes (ie selling of houses, giving up jobs etc,) should not be undertaken, until a visa is granted. I suppose this is their kopout, for when the rules we applied under at the time, need changing?

 

The minister has stated that he wants more employer sponsered visas ( I know this has been covered elsewhere), but what is he doing to encourage this? It maybe ok for large companies to (help)pay for skilled workers to obtain visas, but what about smaller companies? I can't see them spending out on attracting workers from overseas?

 

Any thoughts?

 

Cheers

 

Paul

[Guest rachbarlow]

I was very annoyed, and still am, what I learned on Friday, all processing stopped. Now I am sat in a queue not going anywhere!! I would rather they make a list, SMP SOL whatever, if you are on it great, if not well at least you know where you stand and stick to it. Fill the quota for the year, then review it every year when the new quota comes up, and change it accordingly to meet the demand of the country. To me it is not rocket science!!!

 

At least that way I could get on with my life and know what the hell I am doing and where we stand as an applicant, rather than boinging up and down the categories and having my applicantion sat on some disgruntled DIAC employees desk now doing absolutly nothing.

 

These constant changes are confusing and totally unecessary. I feel that the person heading all of this clearly has no idea, and is making a relatively simple process into a total farse, mess and a headache for the applicants.

[Guest rachbarlow]

Hi, not been on in a while, and after eading the replies to this latest piece of news, thought i'd like to comment.

 

I agree with Rachbarlow, about the "safety" of visas already applied for. The DIAC changes things so "randomly", that it does make you uneasy about applications already in the system. I know that once you have applied, your points etc are safe, but for how much longer?

The DIAC website, does say something about - no visa is guaranteed, and major lifestyle changes (ie selling of houses, giving up jobs etc,) should not be undertaken, until a visa is granted. I suppose this is their kopout, for when the rules we applied under at the time, need changing?

 

The minister has stated that he wants more employer sponsered visas ( I know this has been covered elsewhere), but what is he doing to encourage this? It maybe ok for large companies to (help)pay for skilled workers to obtain visas, but what about smaller companies? I can't see them spending out on attracting workers from overseas?

 

Any thoughts?

 

Cheers

 

Paul

 

 

I feel that most of the smaller businesses in comparison would not really want to take on the extra cost, or even the commitment of an overseas applicant.

 

In addition people like my OH would not want to be employer sponsered. He has been self employed for 22 years. Both of us would not want to be tied to an employer for x amount of years, or want to meet the conditions of the employers sponsored route. So where would that leave us? At the end of the day we would be contributing to the economy with our skills, probably employing an ozzie apprentice, and not costing any employer anything............... I therefore cannot understand pushing this route............

 

I do think though as I said before don't be lured into a false sence of security just because you have your application acknowledged and they have your money!!

[Guest eddie]

Thats what I was thinking, why would a company spend out money to employ overseas workers? Surely the Oz government, have to make it very simple/easy/cheap for employers to go down this route?

 

I cant see why things have to be so complicated, as Rachbarlow says, have a skills list, have a quota, when the quota is full, stop until the folowing year. Review each year. Or would the Oz government, then lose out on lots of visa application fees?

[Guest rachbarlow]

Or would the Oz government, then lose out on lots of visa application fees?

 

They can afterall only have the fees of the applications they can process! I therefore don't think that our sane process would loose them anything, but gain a much smoother operation and happy..er...... DIAC employees and applicants! Money for old rope!:daydreaming:

[Guest tiemekanga]

Having followed this thread from the start and also beening involved in the visa process since 2008, I have to say I feel totally let down by the whole process of applying for a visa. Firstly, endless new hoops to jump through, including SS, IELTS to gain extra points at more cost to me and thousands of others, then those poor people who had their visa capped and ceased who had been waiting since 2007, the MODL ceased with no notice, introduction of the new SOL delayed, and now the absolute last slap in the face the suspension of GSM. It seems to me, being only a lowly hopeful future Oz resident that this will all come back to bite the Australian Immigration on the backside.

 

When they have slowed down the process so much the Australian companies are going to be screaming for skilled people and will be then faced with the long and arduous process of sponsoring overseas applicants. I for one feel like telling them 'They can find me in Canada!!!!!'

 

ARRRHH!!!

[Christopher McGrath]

The Budget just announced makes the statement that the numbers for all migration will remain at 168700.

 

Skilled migration will Decrease by 3600 places but employer nomination will INCREASE by 9150. Also there will be an an additional 200 places in the business migration program

 

So not all doom and gloom.

 

Cheers

 

Chris

[Doc 53]

Ok, now I am a bit confused.

I thought the SOL was being re-written. From what I read here the only way you will get an off shore visa is to get sponsored by an employer. Is that correct.

 

I am an electrical engineer and have state sponsorship from Queensland, skills assessment etc. Only just got back off holiday so could not put in visa (sponsorship arrived day before I left).

 

Is all my paper work now worthless or is this just a blip?

 

As said I am well confused.

 

Doc

[Guest michael.rankin12@bt]

no the web-site did not hold up. it crashed with a few hours to go and we were stuck in the middle of it. thanks austarlia!

[Farrukh Zeeshan]

Ok, now I am a bit confused.

I thought the SOL was being re-written. From what I read here the only way you will get an off shore visa is to get sponsored by an employer. Is that correct.

 

I am an electrical engineer and have state sponsorship from Queensland, skills assessment etc. Only just got back off holiday so could not put in visa (sponsorship arrived day before I left).

 

Is all my paper work now worthless or is this just a blip?

 

As said I am well confused.

 

Doc

 

Just wait for the new SOL and points system. You will still be able to apply once they lift the suspension. Just a matter of days or few weeks. No need to worry about it. Just chill:biggrin: