Federal Skills and Training Minister Brendan O’Connor has blamed a backlog of 960,000 unprocessed skilled migrant applications for cutting WA’s allocation of skilled migrant allowance by up to 70 per cent.

WA’s own Training Minister Simone McGurk has questioned the cut in the face of growing construction and labour shortages, and Mr O’Connor responded with the need to deal with a glut inherited by the previous government.

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“Most of those that we’ve processed have gone back into the Australian economy,” Mr O’Conner said.

“We’re happy to talk to the West Australian Government about the allocations; we really did inherit an absolute mess.”