Like we did, no doubt you too noticed the recent Job Ready, Barista Basics and Management Pathway advertising emanating from City of Fremantle and the Fremantle Chamber of Commerce in recent weeks.

Does this all mean what we think it means, that businesses around Freo are struggling to find staff for all sorts of jobs? Surely not!

So we asked Chrissie Maus, the wonderfully energetic CEO of the Chamber, if we could meet to get a handle on what’s apparently happening around Freo jobwise, which Chrissie kindly and readily agreed to do.

The first thing Chrissie did was share with us official State employment data as of 4 April 2024 for the Perth South region (bigger than Freo but including Freo and indicative of the state of the employment market generally), which discloses there were 496 responding employers in the 12 months to February 2024, of whom 52% were recruiting or had recruited in the past month. Of these recruiting businesses, 54% had difficulty recruiting. By comparison, 50% of employers were recruiting in Greater Perth over the same period, of whom 53% had difficulty recruiting.

It turns out that employers in Perth South were most likely to report the following reasons for recruitment difficulty:
• Lack of suitable applicants
• Lack of applicants
• Undesirable working conditions/hours
• Applicants lack experience.

Certainly, talking to Chrissie, members of the Chamber are reporting these very same reasons for recruitment difficulty locally.

One beauty business, for example, has reported difficulty in finding the well qualified employees they had no trouble recruiting 5 years ago.

Even Fremantle Prison is desperately understaffed at the moment.

And local success story, Rottnest Island ferry operators Sealink, are also challenged in recruiting and retaining great staff.

For official government stats & further information follow the link below.