The Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs has recently announced changes which will allow aged care providers to hire overseas workers to assist with supporting communities of older Australians from multicultural backgrounds.

These changes have been made as a response to the growing need for bilingual carers (particularly in circumstances where elderly people revert to their native language or lose their ability to speak a second language) and carers who are familiar with the particular cultural needs of elderly people from a variety of cultural backgrounds.

The changes will allow for aged care providers to request company specific labour agreements to sponsor skilled overseas workers for both temporary (TSS) and permanent residency (ENS) visas.

Potential labour agreement concessions for aged care providers include:

• A permanent residency pathway for nominees;
• An age concession for nominees (increasing the age limit from 45 years to 55 years of age); and
• A reduced English language proficiency requirement.

We invite you to contact our migration team to discuss how a company labour agreement may assist your business to support older Australians from multicultural backgrounds.