For publican Harry Barry, who runs pubs from Grafton to Taree, backpackers are the lifeblood of his business. He says many of his employees are considering returning home after the government announced a ballot system that would effectively cap second-year visa places. "The incentive was a guarantee they could extend their visas by another 12 months," Mr Barry said. "A lot of them are deciding that there is no guarantee that [they're] going to be earning enough money to pay [their] way."
The new system caps second-year visas at 45,000 places for those who complete the standard 88 days of regional work, with even fewer third-year places available. About 57,000 people qualified for second-year visas last year.
Mr Barry, director of the North Coast Hotel Group, has employed 80 backpackers over the past two years, with 20 still on his books. He said the reliance on visa holders was driven by a lack of local applicants. "If we're employing 80 backpackers, we're doing it for a reason, and the reason is we can't find local workers to fill the slots."
According to jobs website Seek, there were more than 130 vacancies in the Coffs Harbour region in the industry on Wednesday.
Mr Barry is backing a push to establish the region as a priority area for semi-skilled migrants through a Designated Area Migration Agreement (DAMA). A DAMA is an agreement between the federal government and a state or regional authority that helps fill roles that would otherwise remain empty, allowing skilled migrants in industries such as hospitality, agriculture and engineering to move to the area for work. These agreements are typically in place for five years before being reviewed. "[A DAMA] would certainly give us another string in our bow if we are going to be out there in a market that's trying to attract these backpackers back to our region," Mr Barry said.