Advice greatly appreciated .......

Fireman Sam

Hi,

I am currently living in the UK in Nottingham and I am becoming more and more disollusioned with this country as time goes on.

As a result my family and I are seriously looking at relocating abroad and New Zealand would be by far and away our first choice.

I am currently in full time employment in the UK, employed as a Firefighter for the last 16 years. My partner is also employed full time as a railway guard.

Tentative enquiries would suggest that neither of these professions is likely to help in an application to emigrate to NZ.

I am considering either studying for a degree in an as yet undecided subject, or retraining for a trade within the construction industry possibly Plumbing or as a Electrician.

Which of these proposed routes is likely to be viewed as the more desirable by the New zealand immigration authorities ?

Any advice at all would be greatly appreciated as this is the first time that I have "dipped my toe in the water" over the issue of relocating to New Zealand.

just for a bit of background information, I am 39 years of age and my partner is 35 y/o - both in good health and educated.

I look forward to hearing your views
thanks Confused

JCM · Posted: Wed Feb 18, 2004 11:04 am Post subject:

Hi Sam,

Purely my personal opinion, I'd go for the plumbing or electrician route. They're both in short supply here and the situation seems likely to stay that way. Also, you're probably more employable, more quickly for immigration purposes with these skills than if you do a degree.

I'm have no doubt others will disagree with me. Mr. Green

Robert · Posted: Wed Feb 18, 2004 5:12 pm Post subject:

If you got a job offer, a work visa would be a possible route. With NZ work experience you would stand a better chance in the application process....

Rob

Fireman Sam · Posted: Wed Feb 18, 2004 9:32 pm Post subject:

.... Thanks for the advice guys.

Another option for me is to try and get in the Police force over here in the UK as the pension scheme is very similar to my current one in the Fire Service. This obviously as advantages to me as I can transfer my pension contributions very easily and I would only have a similar period of time to work before I could draw my full pension.

Does anyone know anything about the New Zealand Police Force and their recruiting policy towards serving police officers from the UK ?

once again any help would be greatly appreciated ......

thanks

Taffy · Posted: Thu Feb 19, 2004 4:55 am Post subject: Trade qualifications

Hi,
If you were considering going in to a trade such as an electrician, it may be worth you noting that even if you did qualify as an electrician, you will still have to re-train and register in New Zealand as they, as do most countries, have different regulations in this industry. I'm not sure this would cause any application problems, but it would certainly involve extra costs for you, and more than likely you would have to be registered in NZ before your residency would be approved.

As for the police force, there has been some gossip that UK police being employed by the NZ force are responsible for paying for their childrens education as they are still treated as being international students.. As you can imagine, that could work out expensive! If you have kids of course!

Hope this is useful!

Regards
Taffy

John Miller · Posted: Mon Feb 23, 2004 4:43 pm Post subject: Re: Trade qualifications

Fireman Sam · Posted: Tue Feb 24, 2004 2:44 am Post subject: carpentry or joinery ?

Hi,

Many thanks for the replies to my thread so far...

I am struggling to find out any information as to the need for qualified carpenter/joiners in NZ and whether there is a shortage of them in the construction industry ?

The shortage of Electricians and plumbing/heating engineers is well documented but with regards to joiners I can find very little information ?

any help again would be greatly appreciated as I have to make my descision as to what trade to choose in the next month or so

thanks

rodders · Valued Member Joined: 25 Nov 2003 Posts: 134

sam, imo you should train for the job you reckon you'll enjoy best. i reckon there's always going to be work for plumbers and sparkies.

volusia · Posted: Thu Feb 26, 2004 8:42 am Post subject: hi ya sam

my family and i visited new zealand last october,a great place to think about going to.
we spent a month touring the north island,[3,500klms] and we had a great time.
we will be going back in the very near future[3mths]ish.
just a thought for you to ponder--!you say your a fireman,do you not want to carry on in this line of work?
whilst we were over there, nearly every town we passed through, we saw advertisments for fire recruitment,ok alot were for part time crews, but my point is, a chap with your experience in firefighting and all the other work related to it ie: rescue/first aid etc might be able to find work with the NZ fire service training other people.
bearing in mind that most other trades require some form of nz recognition, fire service training must surley be the same the world over,with possibly a few minor exceptions.

sorry i can't offer any help regarding your initial question,but i thought you might like to know what we saw whilst over there,

cheers and good luck to you in what ever course you decide to take.

look us up when you get over there and we'll have a pint Clink

i see your from nottingham,so are we!

cheers