I want to live&work in Australia, help please?

Question

I'm a student in England and I finish my degree in a few weeks, thinking long term, I've decided I'm not quite ready for the City hustle and bustle although it's something I intend to in the future.

Ideally, what I'd love to do is to get a jbo in finance/banking/business in Australia. I feel the change of environment would do wonders for me. As far as I know, I can apply for a year's working visa which costs around £100+, however, I'd ideally like to be out there for at least 2-3years

To cut a long story short, can anyone recommend any job agencies in England which specialise in locate foreign jobs or vice versa(i.e. Australian firms seeking UK/foreign based graduates/workers) ideally for the financial sector or otherwise.

Thanks a lot for reading this, here's hoping for some great responses!

Answer 1

The one year visa which you are probably thinking of is the "young person's working holiday" visa. it is available to those aged 18-30 and gives the right to work, but for a maximum of 6 months for any one employer. It is designed to give "young people" the opportunity to have an extended holiday in Australia and fund themselves whilst here.

Longer stays require different visas, for example a subclass 457 is valid for 4 years and is available on an employer sponsorship and is designed to bring into Australia skilled personnel not available here - we have a substantial skilled labour shortage. Do you think that a degree rates you as "skilled"?

Anyway, for all of the answers to all of your questions regarding visa's & immigration, go to the following very informative government site:

http://www.immi.gov.au

Answer 2

The 12 month Working Holiday visa allows you to work for up to 6 months for any given employer and cannot be extended unless you do seasonal farm work in regional Australia.

Your only other alternative is to come in on a Skilled Worker visa of some kind. In order to qualify for a SW visa, your occupation needs to be one that is short of staff in Australia and appears on the Skilled Occupation List (SOL) and you need to pass a points test. Business Long Stay Class 457 visas are also available where employers can bring in skilled workers on contracts for varying lengths of time and Employer Sponsored Skilled Migration visas are also available. The underlying principle on all of these visas is that the skill of the visa applicant must appear on the SOL.

Go to http://www.immi.gov.au/skilled/index.htm

Check out the SOL and take the points test. Go to the Skills Matching Database to see if your skills are matched by any employer requirement already on the database. If your skills are on the SOL and you can pass the points test, you could also go to the main Australian employment sites like http://www.seek.com.au/ and http://www.seek.com.au/ and check out the opportunities there.

Good luck.

EDIT: For some reason, I'm having trouble opening PDFs today so I can't look at Form 1121i (the SOL). If memory serves me though, accountants are on there as being in demand. Have a look and see - hopefully you won't have the same problem as I did.

Answer 3

Australia doesn't actually go out and look for foreigner's. Mainly only doctors we need from abroud. If your qualified you should be able to get a job in the financial dept. Let me know if you head to Perth (Western Australia). Good luck with everything!!