{"id":66714,"date":"2026-08-07T00:17:15","date_gmt":"2026-08-07T00:17:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/66714\/"},"modified":"2026-08-07T00:17:15","modified_gmt":"2026-08-07T00:17:15","slug":"balingup-cafe-battles-prohibitive-costs-of-sponsoring-beloved-skilled-worker","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/66714\/","title":{"rendered":"Balingup cafe battles ‘prohibitive’ costs of sponsoring beloved skilled worker"},"content":{"rendered":"

A cafe owner in southern Western Australia is facing an increasingly expensive battle to retain a valued worker amid uncertainty over the federal government’s pending changes to the migration system.<\/p>\n

Penny Hung has become part of the fabric in Balingup, about 231 kilometres south of Perth.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The town has a population of about 560 people and is thousands of kilometres from Ms Hung’s home in Taiwan.\u00a0<\/p>\n

She has become a mainstay employee at one of the few cafes around, where she works as an all-rounder.<\/p>\n

“I think for my personality, I prefer the country life,” she said.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Penny Hung is working to secure a visa so she can stay in the small town of Balingup. (ABC South West WA: Gabrielle Becerra Mellet)<\/p>\n

“Balingup is very special; people here are very caring.<\/p>\n

“It’s very hard work to try to stay here.”\u00a0<\/p>\n

Keeping qualified staff ‘impossible’<\/p>\n

Cafe owner Brian Foster said Ms Hung was a core part of the cafe, filling an important role in a town where it was hard to secure long-term hospitality employees. \u00a0<\/p>\n

“Keeping qualified people is impossible,” he said.<\/p>\n

“Penny’s done so much training over the years, and she’s an integral part of the business, and she wants to stay here.”<\/p>\n

Mr Foster said he had begun the process of applying to sponsor Ms Hung, but the processing costs and minimum salary rate made it prohibitively expensive for a small business.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Brian Foster says Ms Hung is a crucial part of his business. (ABC South West WA: Gabrielle Becerra Mellet)<\/p>\n

It comes as the government moves to reduce net overseas migration<\/a>, shifting its priorities for onshore visa applicants from skilled workers in regional communities to law enforcement and defence.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Balingup is about a 10-minute drive from the world’s largest hard-rock lithium mine, Greenbushes, where Talison Lithium employs more than 1,500 people.<\/p>\n

“Why would you work in a cafe in a village like this when you can earn that sort of money?” Mr Foster said.<\/p>\n

“It’s hard keeping staff when you’re competing with something like that.”<\/p>\n

Ms Hung is working to secure a solution so she can remain in Australia long term, having already used her working holiday visa.<\/p>\n

Pay thresholds increasing<\/p>\n

In 2023, the Australian government increased the threshold employers have to pay sponsored employees for the first time in about a decade, from $53,900 to $70,000.<\/p>\n

Since then, the threshold has risen further to $79,423.<\/p>\n

Under the South West Designated Area Migration Agreement (DAMA), some concessions are offered to the threshold, as well as concessions for minimum standards of English or skills and experience.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Penny Hung is working to secure a visa to stay in Balingup. (ABC South West WA: Gabrielle Becerra Mellet)<\/p>\n

That agreement is due to expire in December.<\/p>\n

If Mr Foster were able to secure a concession under the DAMA, the minimum salary rate would be about $71,480.<\/p>\n

“When the original income was about $50,000, that was very doable for a small business,” he said.<\/p>\n

“It’s a bit of a kick in the guts as far as immigration goes and sponsorship.”Sponsorships ‘expensive’<\/p>\n

South West migration agent Maaike van der Zon said the increases to minimum salaries for sponsored employees in recent years had been significant.<\/p>\n

“It’s very difficult for some people to find sponsorship because it is too expensive or the salary level is just too high and especially for regional businesses,” she said.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Maaike van der Zon said it was difficult for some people to find sponsorship when the minimum salary was too high. (ABC South West WA: Gabrielle Becerra Mellet)<\/p>\n

A Department of Home Affairs spokesperson told the ABC that skilled visa income thresholds were indexed annually, in line with average weekly earnings.<\/p>\n

“Indexation of income thresholds reduces risk of exploitation of skilled migrants, which could occur if there is a lack of wage growth and greater gaps between their wages and those of Australian workers,” they said.<\/p>\n

The full details of the government’s looming overhaul of the migration system are not yet known, but the spokesperson said the latest ministerial direction would prioritise onshore applicants in order to retain migrants already contributing to communities.<\/p>\n

“Under the new Ministerial Direction 119, employer sponsors in regional Australia in healthcare, education and now construction retain priority processing for applicants who are in Australia,” they said.<\/p>\n

Ms van der Zon said while a move to prioritise onshore applicants was welcome news for skilled migrants in Australia, she wanted to understand the impact on visa processing times.<\/p>\n

“At the moment we’re looking at seven, eight, nine months for those particular visas to be processed which are only temporary skilled visas,” she said.<\/p>\n

“We don’t know yet where processing times are heading even with this new ministerial direction where they say they’re prioritising onshore applications.<\/p>\n

“We still have to see if that’s really going to make an impact on visa applications that are currently in the system.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A cafe owner in southern Western Australia is facing an increasingly expensive battle to retain a valued worker…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":66715,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[22,21,83881,83882,83879,6872,83883,2177,83880,83877,83876,83878,1686,464],"class_list":["post-66714","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-austrlia","tag-balingup-cafe","tag-barista-work","tag-hospitality-jobs","tag-immigration","tag-kitchen-all-rounder","tag-migration","tag-migration-changes","tag-mr-fosters-cafe","tag-skilled-worker-sponsorship","tag-south-west-cafe-jobs","tag-south-west-news","tag-wa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66714","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66714"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66714\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66715"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66714"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66714"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/australia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66714"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}