Can anyone shed some light on this for me please, our best friends are coming out to visit us in april, they have expressed an interest that they may, after there visit, consider moving to Oz, the thing is my mate Gordon is 47, and i believe the cut off is 45, he is a skilled electrician, but in the last lot of years he has run his own window installation business. Is there another way that he will be able to get in, i have had a bit of a look at the immi site but i am not getting anything of use.

I hope that someone who knows, or indeed has gone through this can help out.

Thanks in anticipation,

Mark.

With respect, isn't *he* the one who should be doing his research, not you?

The bottom line is that general skilled migration is closed, however there may be options for state sponsored business migration or (better still) employer nomination. Booklets 7 and 5 from the DIMIA site are a start point.


Jeremy

Hi Jeremy,

Thanks for the link, i will check it out.

My mate did not ask me to do this for him, i offered to help out a bit, suppose thats what friends are for!!!!!

Mark.

If you look under Regional Sponsored Migration Scheme (RSMS) in Booklet 5 you will see flexibilities for 45 and over in regional areas. And as regional areas are crying out for skills then he should have no bother. For jobs look up the Jobs In Regional Areas of this website: www.migration.wa.gov.au (state government of western australia skills migration website).

"He should have no bother" is being very optomistic in my opinion considering he has not been an electrician for "the last lot of years".

If he was a practising electrician I would say a sponsored visa could be obtained. He is not so I suspect it would be difficult.

I guess I was primarily stating the facts regarding the 45 yrs and over issue on a regional sponsored visa and jobs available in regional WA. I grant you he has to sort out if he is has the skills - TRA assessment etc.