A sparsely-populated Australian state is to try and poach 31,000 British workers with the promise of high wages and a lower cost of living.
A delegation from Western Australia will visit the UK later this month in a bid to recruit doctors, police officers and teachers.
Australian officials are planning to stress that they can outdo low British wages, which have not risen across the board in real terms since the 2008 financial crisis.
Miners, plumbers, builders, and mechanics will also be targeted in the push to bolster the booming desert region’s workforce.
But the recruitment drive comes at a difficult time for the UK economy, with labour shortages hitting both public services and private industry.
Brexit and the pandemic are among factors to have exacerbated the shortages, which are hitting sectors like the health service, transport, agriculture, and hospitality.
UK ministers has so far shown little sign of pushing for higher wages and on Wednesday suggested they might bring in tighter restrictions on sick notes as a way of keeping more people in work.
British workers can expect another substantial pay cut this year as wages fail to keep up with inflation. The government’s refusal to meet pay demands has provoked strikes across a range of public services.
Western Australia’s police and defence industry minister Paul Papali saida: “Our wages are higher and our cost of living is lower. Our health system is world class. You will be taken care of.
“Many of our ancestors were sent from the UK to Australia as convicts. Now, it would be a crime not to make the move.”
Professor Phil Banfield, chair of British Medical Association council, said the NHS was “perilously exposed to these kinds of tactics from other countries at a time when doctors and healthcare staff are in desperately short supply globally”.
And Rachel Harrison, GMB National Secretary, said: “It’s no wonder NHS workers are tempted to up sticks to another health service which pays better.
“The UK Government has allowed NHS workers’ wages to fall behind, which is a massive factor in health service’s record 133,000 vacancies and missed performance standards.
“If ministers want to retain the best asset of the health service – the workforce – they need to talk pay now.”
Western Australia has just 2.76 million inhabitants despite being around 20 times the size of England.
Its largest city, Perth, sits in its south western corner, and has a population of 2.2 million. The bulk of the rest of the state has a desert or arid climate.
The state’s economy is booming thanks to its mining and fossil fuel extraction industries, with the territory producing nearly half of Australia’s exports.
