Andrew Willcox, Member for Dawson is calling on the Federal Government to immediately reverse its decision to impose a de facto regional processing penalty on skilled workers in priority sectors hoping to take up one of thousands of jobs that need to be filled in regional communities.
Mr Willcox said, “As rural and regional communities in Dawson are crying out for skilled healthcare workers, nurses, disability support workers, teachers and doctors are being unfairly prevented from priority visa processing because of Government imposed red tape.”
Mr Willcox added that thousands of critical workers are being unfairly denied prioritisation of visa because they want to live in regional and rural Australia.
“By failing to recognise Skilled - Regional visa (subclass 887) visa in its prioritisation the Government is effectively encouraging skilled workers to move to the city.”
The Home Affairs website indicated 90 per cent of Skilled - Regional visa (subclass 887) visas are being processed in 27 Months and information released under FOI indicates there could be as many as 19,000 Skilled - Regional visas awaiting processing by the Department.
The Deputy Leader of the Opposition and Member for the regional New South Wales seat of Farrer, Sussan Ley said the Federal Government is failing regional, rural and remote communities through this shoddy decision made by a rookie minister.
“Minister Giles’ inbox is overflowing with mail on this issue and we’ve heard nothing but crickets from him, it is simply not good enough and needs to be fixed immediately,” the Deputy Leader of the Opposition said.
“As a result of this complete stuff up by Minister Giles, workers that are desperately needed in regional communities are missing out on priority processing.”
Andrew Willcox, Member for Dawson called on the Federal Government to immediately prioritise processing of regional workers in Dawson.
“Our community deserves better than being relegated to the slow lane of visa processing just because we live in rural and regional Australia, it is just not good enough and I am calling it out,” he said.
The Shadow Minister for Health and regional South Australian Senator, Anne Ruston said communities in rural, regional and remote Australia are currently crying out for critical healthcare professionals, yet the Government continues to sit on their hands when it comes to this workforce crisis.
“This extremely disappointing action comes on top of their decision to rip overseas-trained doctors out of country towns through changes to the Distribution Priority Areas and to cut 70 telehealth-related Medicare items that were providing immediate primary care access to mostly rural Australians.”
Andrew Willcox, Federal Member for Dawson (left) is championing the cause for skilled workers in rural and regional communities
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