The top five migrant occupations among sponsored workers were accountant, cook, software programmers, software engineers and developer programmers.
The top source country for migrants in 2011/12 was India with 29,018 followed by China with 25,509.
Meanwhile, the UK has dropped to third (after India and China) for the first time in decades – just over 25,000 UK citizens migrated here in the last year.
Ireland is the eighth largest source of migrants to Australia, with almost 5000 Irish folk (a 30% increase) migrating here permanently in the last 12 months.
The statistics include those granted permanent residency onshore and offshore but do not include, those on 457 sponsored visas or other temporary residents.
The total migration program outcome for the year to June 2012 was 184,998.
Of these, 125,755 people came in through the skilled stream while 58,604 places were taken up through the family stream.
Of the skilled migrants, over 46,000 were sponsored by their employer and the vast majority of those – over 35,000 – were onshore applicants.
The number of migrant visas issued to workers sponsored by their employers has more than doubled since 2006/07.
Many of those workers granted migrant visas were already on temporary residency visas like the 457, another indicator that this is the most desirable path to permanent residency.