Western Australia’s booming mining and resources market is certainly a plus, but it does have its downside. The Government’s Regional Sponsored Migration Scheme (RSMS) brings overseas skilled workers to Australia. However, WA has not yet been included in the scheme, despite attempts from Workforce Development Minister Peter Collier.
As the number of mining jobs increase, the WA resources sector is being forced to take employees from other sectors to maintain operation. This means jobs will be drained from these sectors, including hospitality. If a large quantity of workers are moving to work in resources, there needs to be some sort of injection back into the remaining sectors, to avoid skills shortages.
The WA Department of Training and Workforce Development have said that if nothing is done and the resources sector continues to increase, the state could face a skilled shortage of 150,000 across numerous sectors by 2017.
Job Shortage Threatens WA Industries
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