A new Ministerial Direction for prioritising skilled visa applications came into effect on 28 October 2022 which aims to assist in further streamlining visa processing. The Department of Home Affairs has finalised over 2,780,000 visas since 1 June 2022. This includes over 43,000 temporary skilled applications and over 47,000 permanent skilled visa applications.
The Ministerial Direction No. 100:
- Prioritises applications in relation to healthcare and teaching occupations, as well as offshore permanent and provisional applications.
- Helps small businesses seeking to recruit overseas workers. It speeds up processing for all occupations and makes the process less complicated. This change will allow more applications to be processed faster, particularly for the critical Temporary Skill Shortage visa.
- Restores priority for Accredited Sponsors in all sectors who are trusted employers and key businesses that drive economic productivity. Efficient processing of these applications allows the Department to have more capacity to handle other applications as well
- Ceases the Priority Migration Skilled Occupation List (PMSOL) and critical sectors
- Reduces the number of priorities, which will increase efficiencies and assist in reducing processing times across caseloads. It allows the Department to consider applications which were not prioritised under the previous direction, while progressing steady volumes of incoming visa applications.
Which skilled visas are subject to the Ministerial Direction No. 100?
- Subclass 124 (Distinguished Talent)
- Subclass 186 (Employer Nomination Scheme)
- Subclass 187 (Regional Sponsored Migration Scheme)
- Subclass 188 (Business Innovation and Investment) (Provisional)
- Subclass 189 (Skilled – Independent)
- Subclass 190 (Skilled – Nominated)
- Subclass 191 (Permanent Residence (Skilled Regional))
- Subclass 457 (Temporary Work (Skilled))
- Subclass 482 (Temporary Skill Shortage)
- Subclass 489 (Skilled – Regional (Provisional))
- Subclass 491 (Skilled Work Regional (Provisional))
- Subclass 494 (Employer Sponsored Regional (Provisional))
- Subclass 858 (Global Talent)
- Subclass 887 (Skilled – Regional)
- Subclass 888 (Business Innovation and Investment (Permanent).
What is the order of priority for processing skilled visa applications?
- Visa applications in relation to a healthcare or teaching occupation.
- For employer sponsored visas, visa applications where the applicant is nominated by an Approved sponsor with Accredited Status.
- Visa applications in relation to an occupation to be carried out in a designated regional area.
- For permanent and provisional visa subclasses, visa applications that count towards the migration program, excluding the Subclass 188 (Business Innovation and Investment (Provisional)) visa.
- All other visa applications.
The new priorities apply to all skilled visa nomination and visa applications that are yet to be decided, as well as new applications lodged.
Source: https://www.victorianchamber.com.au/cdn/2b5853c8-d4b2-491b-b8f9-35d9931db14d.pdf