Australia has removed gardeners, hairdressers from list of preferred occupations for immigration.
More than 5,000 Indian students have been affected by the shutting down of 37 ‘immigration’ colleges in Australia. The colleges had to be shut after Australia issued a new list of preferred occupations for skilled immigrants which leaves out cooks, gardeners, hairdressers, fitters, journalists and fashion designers.
“So far, 37 colleges have been shut down in Australia, affecting over 5,000 Indian students,” overseas Indian affairs minister Vayalar Ravi told Lok Sabha on Thursday. However, such students are either likely to get a refund of their fees or be offered other colleges.
Earlier this month, Australia had issued a new list of preferred occupations, cutting down the list by more than half. In February, it scrapped the Migrations Occupations in Demand or Model programme for encouraging the immigration of skilled workers and replaced it with a less welcoming Skilled Occupations List.
In addition, it removed or reduced benefits enjoyed by a prospective immigrant who has a relative in Australia and raised scores in English language tests, making entry tougher for many Indians.
The changes came shortly after a spate of racial attacks on Indian students and uproar over the number of Indians using student courses to migrate to Australia. Many students, especially from north Indian states such as Punjab and Haryana, had signed up for courses such as cookery and gardening in the hope of benefiting from the ‘preferred jobs’ regime. The laws ensured that Australia was attracting around 1 lakh students from India every year. The overhaul left many Indian students with few options, including a transition period till the end of 2012 by when they would have to apply for a course in the the available jobs’ list.
The overseas affairs minister said India had requested Australia to process pending applications for permanent residency to those Indian students who had been given visas under the previous regime where the link between education and immigration was implicitly accepted.
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