The Amendment Regulations amend the Migration Regulations to help fill critical labour and skills gaps by temporarily removing certain requirements for applicants for the Subclass 485 visa in the Graduate Work stream.

Presently, applicants for the Graduate Work stream need to:

- nominate an occupation on the Medium and Long-term Strategic Skills List;

- have a degree, diploma or trade qualification closely related to that occupation; and

- be assessed by a relevant assessing authority as having skills suitable for that occupation.

Removing these requirements will encourage more international vocational education and training (VET) graduates to stay and work in Australia for a longer period. It will also open up the visa stream to a broader range of graduates with diploma and trade qualifications that are not closely related to occupations on the skilled occupation list.

These requirements will be removed for all applications lodged during the 2022-23 financial year. The duration of the concession may however be extended, by legislative instrument, should current labour shortages not be ameliorated after this period.

Source: Migration-Amendment-Occupation-Nomination-and-Skills-Assessment-for-Sc-485-visas-Regs-2022.pdf

and 

Migration-Amendment-Occupation-Nomination-and-Skills-Assessment-for-Sc-485-visas-Regs-2022-EXPLANATORY-STATEMENT.pdf