Updated 3.20pm

THE WESTERN AUSTRALIAN Training and Workforce Minister will travel to Dublin this week to kick off a major Irish recruitment drive.

Construction workers, engineers, quantity surveyors, nurses, medical professionals, mechanics, social workers, chefs and tradespeople are all being welcomed with open arms in Western Australia, which is looking for workers to support its resources boom and the mining and petroleum industries.

Jobs Minister Peter Collier says that Western Australia will need 150,000 extra workers by 2017 and that Irish skilled workers are highly employable. He says that if the right people turn up for a seminar at Citywest Hotel on Thursday…

…they’ll come back on the plane with us if we can get them!

The seminar is open to anyone who qualifies on the Western Australia Occupations in Demand List.  Collier says that the state, of which Perth is the capital, offers a “wonderful quality of life and more importantly, employment”.

Last week it was reported that more than two thirds of Irish people heading to Oz choose Western Australia, and in some cases applications by Australian employers to sponsor Irish workers are being processed in five days.

There are a number of visas available for those who wish to travel to Australia, from working holiday visas to applications for permanent residency. Each state has a list of occupations for which workers are in high demand. Earlier this year it was reported that there was a 40 per cent rise in applications for Australian working holiday visas.

During his Dublin stopover Collier will meet with Ciarán Cannon, Junior Minister for Training and Skills to discuss any barriers which are affecting Irish people considering travelling to Western Australia for work.

Thursday’s seminar is free to attend, but anyone who wished to go along must register first via the Work in Western Australia website.