Melbourne. Visa-driven higher education policies may have distorting effects on the domestic market, with local students being the main losers, according to an Australian researcher.
But policy analyst Bob Kinnaird's recommended solution - to curb immigration to improve employment prospects for local information technology gradu-ates - has been suppressed.
Foreign students who complete IT courses in Australia can apply for permanent residency after they graduate, and most are accepted. This has attracted tens of thousands of overseas students to study in Australia and, for the first time in 2003, more overseas students than Australian residents graduated with IT degrees.
Overseas IT professionals are also eligible for residency visas if they meet English-language and qualifications criteria. Last year, more than 9,000 visas were issued to immigrants with IT skills. The majority had graduated from an Australian university.
In a report on the impact on the labour market of foreign students taking IT courses in Australian universities, Mr Kinnaird warns that the skilled migration programme has contributed to higher unemployment and under-employment of local graduates. His research found that nearly a third of computer science graduates and postgraduates were working in sub-professional jobs.
Although the Australian Computer Society commissioned the report, it refused to publish Mr Kinnaird's conclusions and recommendations. The full report is available in the UK.
Mr Kinnaird's recommendations could affect the ACS's revenue. As with other professional associations, it has a role in the immigration system by accrediting the qualifications of IT applicants seeking residency.
Applicants pay the society A$350 (£150) to check their qualifications and this generates A$3.5 million.
Mr Kinnaird also recommends that ACS accreditation be changed from recognising 18 months of tertiary study as adequate for a skilled immigrant to a minimum of three years.
A spokesman for the society rejected claims of conflict of interest, saying that if ACS policies were accepted its revenue would fall because it was also calling for large-scale reductions in permanent immigrants.
Mr Kinnaird's recommendations could also discourage foreign students from studying computer science in Australia, as they would have to stay at university longer before applying for residency.
The report is available from Kinnaird and Associates: bob.kinnaird@bigpond.com