Website highlights benefits of living in Cairns

A new website for people considering a move to Cairns has been launched in response to a wave of regional migration in Australia.

Council’s Choose Cairns website brings together information about housing, jobs and living in the Tropics, as well as video stories from newly-arrived locals about settling into Cairns.

It also features a video Welcome to Country by Traditional Owners from Cairns, encouraging newcomers to learn and appreciate the long history of the area as they look to build a future here.

The site meets a need, identified in Council-commissioned market research late last year, that showed people considering relocation to Cairns were struggling to find reliable information online about making the move.

Cairns Deputy Mayor Terry James said the site presented the great features of living in Cairns, and also addressed the challenges raised by people, such as weather and work progression.

"The COVID-19 pandemic has made a lot of capital city people re-think where they live and how they work, and Cairns is one of the regional areas that is being chosen by people escaping from the city,” Cr James said.

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, Queensland gained 9800 residents between September and December last year. Around half of the newcomers to Queensland settled in Brisbane – the rest have moved to the regions.

Victoria and New South Wales have lost more than 6000 and 5000 residents, respectively, in the same period.

Cr James said that employment opportunities in Cairns were plentiful across many industries, including social work, healthcare, the trades and hospitality.

“We’re hearing from a lot of different industries in Cairns that they have jobs vacancies they are struggling to fill, and this website will play a role in attracting people to the region to help meet that need,” he said.

Dietitian Quinton Ullrich made the move to Cairns from Brisbane just over 12 months ago.

“I was a bit worried about finding a job. It was COVID times and jobs were a bit scarce at the time, but an opportunity came up in Cairns and I jumped on it,” Mr Ullrich said.

"For me, Cairns ticks all the boxes. I really like getting out on the reef and exploring, seeing heaps of great fish, turtles, sharks, amazing coral, but also like going out into the Hinterlands up to the waterfalls,” he said.

See more stories at: https://choose.cairns.qld.gov.au/