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The Western Australia (WA) Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCI) says that the Australian government must increase skilled immigration so that WA can cope with labour demand in the next mining boom.
According to a report by a leading Australian economic consulting firm, Western Australia will lead the nation in output growth for 2010 and beyond. It is also expected that the Western Australian economy will continue to grow in the next financial year.
Immigrants in Canada are waiting from 15 to 19 months to have their Canadian citizenship applications approved due to a large backlog of applications.
In 2009, changes to the Immigration Act meant that more people were eligible for citizenship, leading to an increase in citizenship applications.
"Really it's just a question of enough resources to process all the applications we receive," said Citizenship and Immigration Canada operations manager Paul Snow in an interview with CBS News.
The UK Government will not issue any more Tier 1 (General) visas for the month of October 2010 to first time applicants from outside the UK. The limit does not affect applications from dependents, applications from people in the UK switching into Tier 1 (General) from another category, or people extending their current Tier 1 (General) visas.
The German government hopes to make it easier for foreign-born workers' to have their overseas qualifications recognised in >a href="/germany/employer.htm">Germany. This would also benefit Germany as more overseas workers will be available to fill critical shortages in the German labour market.
Approximately 300,000 foreign-born residents in Germany cannot practice their professions because their qualifications are not recognized, Education Minister Annette Schavan told the German Financial Times.
The European Union Parliament's Civil Liberties Committee (CLC) is backing a single permit directive which will allow citizens of non-EU countries obtain a work and residence permit through a "one-stop shop". The CLC directive is in keeping with the European Union's proposed single permit blue card immigration scheme for the European Union.