Peter Fitzhenry spent more than $6000 and nine months training his star apprentice car spray painter Salvatore Acconcio.
Now Mr Acconcio, 27, faces the threat of deportation back to Italy because his trade has been removed from the government list of skilled occupations open to sponsored migration.
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How 457 visa changes are hitting start-ups
Liz Kaelin and Annie Parker are the human faces of how the crackdown on 457 visas is hurting Australian technology entrepreneurs.
The implementation of the changes announced this year is causing headaches for business owners like Mr Fitzhenry
He says Mr Acconcio was his best apprentice in 40 years' running a panel beating and prestige car repair business.
"I have someone exceptional, a worthwhile citizen, who is hungry and who wants to learn," Mr Fitzhenry said.
"I've invested time, energy, money and resources and there is no recourse for me, it's 'oh sorry Pete', bad luck.
"We've spent thousands of dollars trying to advertise for apprentices but you don't get one phone call."
Mr Fitzhenry said Mr Acconcio was entitled to about $600 a week as an adult apprentice, but was paid $800 per week.
Mr Acconcio applied for a 457 visa in December last year before his occupation, vehicle spray painter, was removed in April from the federal government's list of occupations open to skilled migration. The change is retrospective and applies to the December application, for which Mr Fitzhenry paid a $6000 fee.
Similar trades, including panel beater and painting trades worker, skills Mr Acconcio also performs, remain on the long-term skilled migration list.
Mr Acconcio, whose job is in Camperdown and his partner Chirin Brunello, who works for an interior design company that imports products from Italy, both "love Australia" and want to stay.
"This is the first time in my life someone has believed in me and I don't want to lose this job," Mr Acconcio said.
It's a recipe for category shopping.
University of Sydney's Chris F Wright
"We want to raise a family here, but now all the dreams are broken.
"In Europe there is a crisis and we work a 10-hour day in Italy for less money to survive."
Mr Acconcio has not been given notice to leave Australia, but his migration agent and lawyer have advised it was "only a matter of time".
Ms Brunello said she contacted Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's office to plead their case but her partner's occupation was not among those restored to the list under changes in July.
Immigration law expert Associate Professor Joanna Howe from the University of Adelaide said it was "deeply unfair" for changes to the 457 visa system to apply retrospectively.
She said Mr Acconcio had invested in the migration journey under one set of rules and now had to comply with a new set.
"I think that is an issue in terms of fairness in migration policy making," Dr Howe said.
Influential business groups and Universities Australia have successfully lobbied for a reversal of changes to the occupations list including the restoration of university lecturers and CEOs.
"Your humble mechanic or spray painter doesn't have that kind of advocacy power with the government," Dr Howe said.
"It is still beyond the reach of the ordinary Australian to understand how occupations are subtracted or added to the list and whether vested interests and powerful lobby groups are having greater sway than others."
The changes were also inconsistent in their application to nationals from countries such as China, which has a free trade agreement with Australia.
"If the spray painter had come from China he would probably be allowed to stay because of the exemption in the FTA that prevents Australia from applying labour market testing to Chinese workers," Dr Howe said.
A spokeswoman for the Department of Immigration and Border protection said it could not comment on individual cases but said people who had applied for a 457 visa but are no longer eligible "may apply for another appropriate visa if they wish to extend their stay in Australia".
"They will need meet the relevant regulatory criteria for that visa," the spokeswoman said.
Employment relations expert, Chris F Wright from the University of Sydney Business School said the Department's response was ambiguous
"It potentially provides employers with an invitation to sponsor workers for occupations that are on the sponsored occupations list but might not neatly match the skills they have or the jobs they are performing," he said.
"There are so many occupations on that list that it almost invites employers to pick and choose which occupation to sponsor a worker for, rather than picking the occupation that most accurately reflects their skills and duties.
"It's a recipe for category shopping," he said.
Dr Wright said there was a lack of transparency in the skilled occupations list in contrast with the UK system which publishes explanations for why occupations were on the list of skilled occupations open to sponsored migration.
"A lot of the ambiguity would be resolved if the government moved towards an independent and transparent system for assessing the needs of the labour market and how immigration can best address those needs, such as the Migration Advisory Committee model used in the UK," he said.
"While there were problems with the previous Consolidated Sponsored Occupations List for the 457 visa, there is not much transparency around the criteria and process for which occupations are eligible for the new Temporary Skills Shortage visa categories.
"It wouldn't surprise me if there are inconsistencies in the occupations eligible for the new versus old visas since I'm not convinced that the government's reform have helped to improve the alignment between visa allocation and skills shortages."
Dr Wright said the abundance of university graduates and the presence of occupations such as accounting on the skilled occupations list "represents a misalignment between our education and training system and our immigration regulations in meeting Australia's skills needs".
Employer claims of skills shortages in some industries such as hospitality could potentially be resolved if employees were offered better pay and conditions.
"There may be shortages of workers willing to do the jobs at the current pay rates and conditions. But those pay rates might be unreasonably lower than what locals are prepared to work for," Dr Wright said.
The recent resolution of complaints about changes to the migration guidelines affecting CEOs has effectively meant exempting them from changes to the regulations.
"Governments over the past 15 years have invested a lot of political capital into border security and maintaining the integrity of immigration regulations. If there is a situation where the government is saying it will resolve a problem by not enforcing the regulations then that seems a recipe for disaster and runs completely against its rhetoric around how it manages immigration," Dr Wright said.
Applicants for a subclass 457 visa who are no longer eligible for the program since their nominated occupation has been removed from the list will also be given an opportunity to withdraw their application and get a refund of their visa application charge.
Mr Fitzhenry said he had asked about a refund for the $6000 he spent, but was only told "maybe".
ACTU President Ged Kearney said the working visa system was "broken".
"The system needs to be consistent. It needs to ensure proper labour market testing to protect local jobs while allowing genuine skill shortages to be met," she said.
The Department of Immigration spokeswoman said the updated occupation list for the Temporary Work (skilled) visa (subclass 457) program is designed to be dynamic and reflect genuine needs in the labour market.
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