Although there has been a plunge in the demand for sc457 visa workers with grants down by 25% from last year,  there remain some 108,870 people with 457 visas in Australia as of June 30 this year, up slightly on the same time last year, according to a new Immigration Department report.

A report in the Herald Sun estimates that 'at least one million such migrants have work rights, including 457 visa holders'. However, the report conveniently does not elaborate this point any further. Their figures would probably include students on limited work rights who actually contribute some $15 billion dollars to the economy by choosing to spend their education dollars in Australia over the UK and US. They in fact create work in the Australian economy.

The report also notes that across Australia about 52,000 people got 457 visas in 2013-14, with cook being the number one job (2720 visas), followed by cafe or restaurant manager (2070), computer programmer (1900), marketing specialist (1470), university lecturer (1290) and GP (1270).

In Victoria, there were 960 cooks approved, 560 programmers, 430 cafe or restaurant managers, 370 lecturers and 350 IT business analysts, said the department’s Subclass 457 Quarterly Report.

New Online Solution for Invoicing Overseas Clients in A$

Do you have a forthcoming invoice to send to an overseas client? Are you awaiting payment from a client based outside of Australia?

Migration Alliance have recently partnered with TorFX to introduce their currency exchange and money transfer services to both migrants and RMA’s who are sending and receiving funds to and from Australia, providing a cost saving alternative to the banks and credit card companies.

The Office of Deregulation has responded to a complaint that Migration Alliance made about high registration fees for Registered Migration Agents.    The response is below.

CRT150-Allan-1.pdf

The following email was received on 29 August 2014:

Our reference: 2014-505119

Dear Ms Allan,

If the estimated ten million wealthy Chinese wanting to move into Australia for a ‘clean environment and better education for their children’ get their wish then Australia’s demographics will change permanently. According to a report in The Herald Sun, a parliamentary committee reviewing foreign investment in Australian real estate has been told that there has been a surge in real estate investments by overseas Chinese.

Melbourne has come into focus for these rich Chinese desiring the ‘Aussie lifestyle’ with ‘crowds buying in Melbourne’s most exclusive suburbs’ according to experts quoted in the Herald Sun.

“Suburbs close to private schools and the CBD were the most popular, with Toorak, Brighton, Hawthorn, Albert Park, Middle Park and Deepdene in high demand. And 36,000 new apartments bought by foreign investors are currently being built — more than half of them in Melbourne and some of them wholly bought by foreigners,” notes the report.

The trend has resulted in a parliamentary inquiry investigating foreign ownership of residential properties. The concern is that wealthy foreigners, particularly from China, are buying homes in Melbourne and Sydney and pricing out locals.

First National Real Estate’s Stewart Bunn told the committee that as many as a quarter of all home buyers in the top end of the Melbourne, Sydney and Queensland markets are mainland Chinese.