Jobs go unfilled and businesses miss out in much-needed income

Toowoomba is in the grip of labour shortage 10 years in the making and businesses are suffering as jobs go unfilled.

Since Christmas, Mark and Louise Polley have been desperate for new coach drivers.

They have plenty of customers keen to set off across the Australian Outback on one of their bus tours, but their vehicles are sitting idle.

“We don’t have drivers for them,” Mrs Polley said.

The business has advertised for new drivers and admin staff on a range of platforms but the phones have remained silent.

“A few years ago, we would get hundreds of applicants for an admin job,” Mrs Polley said

The labour shortage has hamstrung the Polleys’ business, Discovery Coaches, as not only have they had to cut their services, but they are prevented from marketing or growing their operation.

Mrs Polley estimated they were about 30 per cent down on takings for the year.

The labour shortage is not unique to Discovery Coaches – it is felt across Toowoomba.

Proterra Group co-owner Jim O’Day is crying out for engineers at his civil construction and consultancy business.

Louise and Mark Polley are keen to hire driver as soon as possible. Picture: Nev Madsen.

He put the shortage down to a combination of Covid-derived uncertainty and Toowoomba’s increasingly sophisticated economy.

“As the economy grows, we are seeing a bigger demand for experienced people in all industries,” he said. “For those experienced people it is hard to draw them away from Brisbane, the Sunshine Coast or Gold Coast.”

Like the Polleys, Mr O’Day has been drawn down into the day-to-day work of his business when he should be focused on growing it.

That shortage of experienced staff is compounded as he is unable to train-up graduates which again stretches the local labour pool.

While Covid may have made experienced workers scared of leaving their current jobs, Mr O’Day said the Darling Downs labour shortage had been brewing for years – long before Covid landed.

He pointed to a survey of Toowoomba jobs ads that showed 27 per cent of vacant positions were for management-level roles and professionals, up from 15 per cent 10 years ago.

“That has been a sustained trend that is across a lot of regional communities,” he said.

The shortage came as no surprise to Toowoomba Chamber of Commerce President Todd Rohl who said the chamber must address it.

This includes talking with interstate recruitment firms about what they needed to get workers to migrate.

He said housing and the cost of moving interstate must be addressed.

“The two biggest problems facing Toowoomba’s economy is the labour shortage and the housing shortage,” he said.