'We've had a mining boom and an IT bust' - the IT industry on 457 debate - ABC Online

"Outside the resource states of Queensland and Western Australia, the single largest sector for temporary overseas work isn't mining - or even construction - it is information technology."

So said the Prime Minister, Jullia Gillard while speaking more about 457 visas this week.

And it's NSW that's leading the way - one in twenty temporary overseas workers in Australia is doing IT work in this state.

But those in the industry are asking - what choice do we have?

"We get better skills. And we just don't have the number of graduates and skilled people applying for jobs," says Michael Cannon-Brookes, CEO of Sydney enterprise software firm Atlassian.

"We've had a mining boom and an IT bust," he says.

The Prime Minister this week highlighted a disparity in the figures - 5,800 temporary workers have been brought in for the IT sector in just seven months compared to 4,500 Australian IT undergraduates in 2011.

Atlassian employ about 320 people in Australia - nineteen per cent of those are on 457 visas.

And according to CEO Michael Cannon-Brookes, the type of people they're employing - software engineers and product managers - have very specific skills. So he denies the industry is shunning local workers.

"They just can't find the talent. If you just do the simple maths - six thousand roughly brought in on 457's, and four thousand graduates.

Did we create more than 10,000 jobs in IT last year? If we did, what's the other alternative than bringing them in?" he asks.

He also denies it's cheaper to employ overseas workers.

"We have to pay more to bring in a foreign worker than we pay for a local worker. The whole beat up that it's saving money is not true, we'd love to hire locally," he claims.

John, a caller to 702 Breakfast works for an IT firm which has about ten percent of its workforce on 457 visas. He says students coming out of universities are about two years behind the industry, so the overseas expertise is needed to advance the company.

"If we didn't have those people here, our company would have to fold. So that would be 700 jobs being lost in Australia."