Federal Budget 2026: SSI-led coalition secures steps forward to ease migrant skills deadlock 

This investment follows sustained advocacy by the Activate Australia’s Skills campaign, convened by SSI, which brought together over 130 organisations across business, unions and the community sector to call for urgent reform to Australia’s skills and qualifications recognition system. 

SSI welcomes the reforms and congratulates the government for placing skills recognition firmly on the national productivity agenda. Every migrant in Australia who is able to work in their licensed profession boosts productivity by around $43,000, with $9 billion added annually to the economy if permanent migrants worked at their skill level at the same rate as Australian-born workers.  

The government’s commitment to accelerate better skills recognition for migrant trade workers is an important productivity win. However, SSI said broader reform is needed to unlock the full productivity benefits across all licensed professions, noting that tens of thousands of engineers, teachers and nurses remain sidelined by costly, slow and complex recognition processes at a time when their skills are urgently needed. 

SSI also welcomed the government’s commitment to consult on a national skills recognition commissioner, a key recommendation of SSI’s coalition campaign. A commissioner with the authority to hold licensing bodies accountable, identify system blockages and drive reform would be a game changer for productivity and make skills recognition faster, fairer and more affordable across all professions. 

While SSI and the Activate Australia’s Skills campaign will actively engage in consultations on the commissioner model, SSI noted that international evidence already demonstrates what works. Commissioners in Canada have strengthened oversight and accountability, improved recognition rates and driven system-wide reform. SSI is calling on the government to move from consultation to commitment and appoint a skills recognition commissioner by the end of the year. 

While welcoming the broader social investments in the budget, SSI urged the government to ensure multicultural communities are not overlooked in major reform agendas. 

SSI welcomed the government’s continued investment in ending gender-based violence, including funding to support women and children leaving violent relationships and strengthen the frontline family, domestic and sexual violence workforce. The dedicated funding commitment to address violence against First Nations women and children is significant and overdue. 

However, SSI said the budget largely overlooks the specific needs of multicultural communities experiencing domestic, family and sexual violence. Migrant and refugee women and children often face additional barriers to accessing support, yet there remains limited targeted investment in culturally responsive services, workforce capability, prevention and early intervention within multicultural and faith communities. 

On disability reform, SSI acknowledged the importance of ensuring the long-term sustainability of the National Disability Insurance Scheme and welcomed the government’s $2 billion Thriving Kids program, including investment in early intervention and supports for children with disability, developmental delay and autism. 

SSI said early intervention programs such as Thriving Kids must reach every child who needs them, and that culturally responsive care cannot be treated as an add-on but must be embedded into the design of the system itself. SSI and UniSA’s Stronger Starts, Brighter Futures II research found that in 2021, children from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds were more likely to be developmentally vulnerable at school entry than their peers. 

Taken together, SSI said the budget signals important progress on productivity and social reform – but that lasting success will depend on ensuring all reform agendas are responsive to the diversity of modern Australia.