Early this month, the Department of Home Affairs allocated limited interim nomination places to states and territories paving way for the opening of the skilled visa programs ahead of the complete allocations to be delivered as part of the Federal Budget announcement on October 6.
2020-21 interim nominations allocations for States and Territories (1 July – 31 October 2020)
| State & Territory | Subclass 190 State/Territory Skilled Nominated | Subclass 491 and 489 Skilled Work Regional (Provisional) | Business Innovation and Investment Program (BIIP) |
| ACT | 250 | 45 | 4 |
| NSW | 550 | 150 | 200 |
| VIC | 600 | 200 | 400 |
| QLD | 200 | 200 | 160 |
| NT | 80 | 80 | 5 |
| WA | 200 | 40 | 70 |
| SA | 300 | 600 | 180 |
| TAS | 250 | 400 | 5 |
| Total | 2430 | 1715 | 1024 |
Source: Department of Home Affairs
The interim allocations are focused on relieving the impact of the pandemic on Australia.
Victoria has received the highest allocation for subclass 190 and the Business Innovation and Investment Program. Given how deeply affected Victoria has been by the pandemic, it is understandable that they are given a higher allocation to enable them to bring more healthcare workers into the state to handle the health situation and to attract more business investment into Victoria.
For the Subclass 491 and 489 Skilled Work Regional (Provisional), South Australia was given the highest allocation, followed by Tasmania.
What does this mean for applicants?
At present, occupations the State and Territory Governments can approve for the SC 491/190 are strictly limited. These allocations are to be used for occupations that are critical to the COVID-19 economic recovery. Critical occupations and industry sectors are:
- – People providing critical or specialist medical services, including air ambulance, medical evacuations and delivering critical medical supplies
- – People with critical skills required to maintain the supply of essential goods and services (such as in medical technology, critical infrastructure, telecommunications, engineering and mining, supply chain logistics, agricultural technology, food production, and the maritime industry).
- – People delivering services in sectors critical to Australia’s economic recovery(such as financial technology, large scale manufacturing, film and television production and emerging technology), where no Australian worker is available.
The full nomination allocations for 2020/21 will be determined later in the year as part of the 2020/21 Budget process which is due to take place in October 2020.
