Australia – Labour Market testing changes
Goodness what a week of changes we are having in the Australian immigration space. A new day comes with a new requirement.
Today’s change is related to the requirements for labour market testing ie advertising the positions when you apply for a 482 The Temporary Skill Shortage (TSS) visa (subclass 482) or the Skilled Employer Sponsored Regional (Provisional) visa (subclass 494) nominations .
The purpose of labour market testing (LMT) is to evidence that a suitably qualified and experienced Australian worker is not available to fill the nominated position. Under policy the evidence of LMT provided should have had sufficient coverage and duration to test the local labour market in order to demonstrate this.
There are exemptions to labour market testing but if your candidate does not meet any of the exemptions and you therefore need to undertake labour market testing, we have outlined the criteria below and highlighted the recent additional requirement.
Evidence that meets the labour market testing criteria is:
- the nominated position has been advertised in Australia for 28 days within the previous 4 months before lodgement of the nomination
- the advertisement is in English and must include the following information:
- the title or a description of the position
- the skills or experience required for the position
- the name of the approved sponsor or the name of the recruitment agency being used by the sponsor
- the annual earnings for the position (if the intended annual earnings are lower than $96,400 AUD)
- a total of at least three advertisements must be published and one of these must be on the Government national recruitment website Jobactive – www.jobactive.gov.au. Please note that this is the new additional criteria.
- The other 2 advertisements can be a choice between any of the following:
- a national recruitment website such as Seek www.seek.com.au or Indeed www.indeed.com.au
- a posting on a social media platform such as a Linked-In Recruitment platform. Note that a general classifieds website or an advertisement on Twitter or Instagram are not acceptable
- national print media with national reach in Australia such as The Australian or The Financial Review
- on national radio – that is, radio programmes that are broadcast or syndicated nationally such as the ABC.
- if the sponsor is an accredited sponsor – on the sponsor’s website.
