Australia’s migration program is failing to deliver the skilled workers we were promised.
An analysis shows that in 2023-24 only 12% of permanent migration spots went to skilled workers — and 0.09% to tradespeople. Meanwhile, the housing crisis worsens.
The system is broken!
— Senate Estimates
Transcript
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for appearing tonight. I want to go to an analysis of the migration program—it’s an analysis done by Emeritus Professor Peter McDonald and Professor Alan Gamlen, who are affiliated with the Migration Hub at the ANU—and also a comment on their analysis by Leith van Onselen, the economist, who says of the report:
Australia’s immigration system is unskilled and broken.
They say, ‘In 2023-24, the permanent migration program’—185,000—’delivered just 166 tradespeople, negligible against national needs.’ The report also shows that just 12 per cent of places in the nation’s permanent migration program are going to skilled workers. Instead, many of these place are being allocated to members of skilled workers’ families. Zero point zero nine per cent of new permanent residents are in the trades. Australians have been promised that the migration program is to fill skills shortages to fix the housing crisis, and that’s being used to justify hundreds of thousands of arrivals—millions over the last few years. Yet now we know that just 166 tradies arrived in one year. Why is your department failing to make sure the people who are granted permanent places in Australia are actually skilled?
Senator Watt: Maybe the place to start, Senator, is what figures the department has around—there was a little discussion about this earlier in a session you weren’t here for, but maybe that’s a decent place to start.
Ms Sharp: Certainly. Thanks, Minister. Going very specifically to primary visa applicants who work in the construction sector, in 2024-25 there were 15,524 skilled visas granted to workers in construction.
Senator ROBERTS: Excuse me—what was the total migration that year?
Mr Willard: 185,000.
Senator ROBERTS: 185,000?
Ms Sharp: That was the permanent program, Senator, yes. Of that permanent program, 8,741 were skilled workers in the construction sector.
Senator ROBERTS: That’s about four per cent.
Senator Watt: But very different to the numbers you were just quoting, Senator.
Senator ROBERTS: Depends how they’re classified, Minister.
Senator Watt: Well, I think you gave a figure of 150-something—
Senator ROBERTS: 166.
Senator Watt: Yes, whereas the actual number is over 8,000—so, pretty big difference.
Senator ROBERTS: We can argue about the accuracy because it depends on the classification, but keep going.
Mr Willard: Senator, I’d add that the permanent program—it’s roughly two-thirds allocated to the skilled program. You are correct that the skilled program includes the primary applicants and their immediate family members, and there were 132,148 places delivered in that skilled program in 2024-25.
