Updated Skills Priority List on June 2021 by Australian Government and National Skills Commission

Overview

The National Skills Commission (NSC) has responsibility for providing trusted and independent intelligence on Australia’s labour market. A key deliverable for the NSC in this role is the Skills Priority List (SPL). The SPL provides a detailed view of shortages as well as the future demand for occupations across Australia. This list provides the backbone piece of labour market analysis on occupations that will be a key input to a range of Australian Government policy initiatives, including targeting of skilled migration, apprenticeship incentives and training funding. Noting that each of these measures will also need to consider other inputs relevant to their specific policy needs. Providing a single source of advice on occupations creates a direct line of input for stakeholders and ensures greater consistency and better targeting of resources across the various policy responses implemented by government. The SPL is reviewed and updated annually and will be published on the NSC website along with any additional reports developed from the analysis of occupations. For further information on the SPL please see the SPL Methodology paper published on the NSC website. SPL Categories Taking account of all available information, a current labour market rating is determined for each occupation. Ratings are provided nationally, and for each state and territory. Where there is evidence suggesting variation between metropolitan and regional locations this is reflected in the rating. A full list and detailed explanation of the ratings is available in the appendix. In addition, each occupation will be given an indicative future demand rating (strong, moderate or soft) to indicate the likely demand for the occupation over the coming five year period using a proportional approach (see page 22 of the methodology). Using these two components, each occupation assessed will be categorised into one of six categories.

Skills Priority List

All occupations will be allocated to one of these categories but will not be further ranked. Where shortages are restricted to regional areas (Regional Shortage), this is shown as (R) against the occupation, and (M) is shown when shortages are restricted to metropolitan areas (Metropolitan Shortage). Both categories fall under the broader ‘Shortage’ assessment rating.