It sounds as though you have had some relationship breakup/down to consider going from Uni to a trade although a trade should not be looked down on as less than a degree in quite a range of areas. ...Don't just give up university without dilligent and unemotive thought...Overseas university qualifications impress the intellectual hierarchy...looks great on their recommendaions when they need an excuse to drop some one local....It is true though that tradesmen well employed can earn far more money than a common engineer...and stay a lot fitter.

Your electricians wages, will well support you in Australia. If returning home later bring to mind I said before about exchange rates.....and don't go working for places like certain boat builders in thewhere you cannot (they say) negotiate rates and where overtime is not paid. Seek money and be available for overtime...but EARN the money and work will be more consistent.

Save it and put your private money also into Superannuation..you could put a couple of hundred a week into super yourself here, if single, and still live well...and you can contribute your portion if and when you please. Your employers compulsory contribution on top of your wages witill be between 9 and 13% of your gross wage...but, do make sure it goes in at least every three months...

If you can get 10,000 per year into good super for 20 years you'll retire ok, for 40 years..very very very well...Average here is about 10% or 12% from the better ones like C Bus and that means a doubling of the annualised Capital every 7 years.

So, you have one block of $10K in year one..after 7 years it is $20K, after 14 years $40K after 21 years $80K, after 28 years (you are now going 50) $160,000 at say 57, $320000 and at 65 more than $640000 ...if you never had put in another dollar!!...so multiply that by other reducing period blocks of 10,000 per year...and you are a very wealthy retiree and you will still have your house paid off ok and brought up a family...

Just pretend the money doesn't exist. Just take the 10,000 from year 2 ...it will be roughly $620,000...now you are an retired millionnaire...and how many other blocks of 10K went in over your 35 years of working life?..granted reducing each block over time to the point where the one at age 57 at that 10% compound rate will return only 20,000 plus some from the 6th,5th 4th 2nd and last year...and the taxation is only 15% on superannuation.

We have a good super system...when you come here, learn it and use it wisely...and of that 10,000 I spoke of, if you limited yourself to only that...your employer would have contributed..on current rates of say just $1000 per week wages.....about $4500 so your contribution would be about 100 per week..were you to contribute 200 instead...that final sum for the fist block would be $800,000.

I took this up again to say, study PLC's and get experience with them as there is a demand for Industrial electricians...study data and communications as well and if possible get licences...good money there too in private work and makes you "rounded" which helps the boss decide to use you. Australian electricans have become victims of the NWO's mediocrity suite...education level is pathetic compared with the past and many employers resent paying apprentices "to learn what we can teach you"...in other words narrowing them down to being useful to him but with no future. Sadly "Industry" has become important in education whereas we should have the best unprejudiced education with modules available for specialist work.

If you are going to buy tools here...may be cheaper than flying yours over...bring quids and convert them...then the tools will seem cheaper...and you can buy EU stamped tools quite cheaply...but don't bother replacing armatures and stators..they cost three times the price of the drill. Betetr tools are available sometimes on ebay...I refer particularly to De Walt...some bargains turn up,there even though it has become a retial dressed as wholesale paradise.

I last month bought two 18V extended life batteries recently for $160 for the two of them delivered...(at the stores...$150 each!) Just bring your favorite hand tools and say 200 or 300 quid to buy whatever else you may need.

An electricians legally demandable "toolset" is something also defined by the unions and Giovernment..there are tools you are expected to have but that does not include large hammer drills or jackhammers but you are expected to have afair selection of hand tools and a battery drill and an electric drilling machine up to say 3/8" chuck.

Safety glasses and helmets are supposed to be provided but you can buy them here amd it is wise to keep your own just in case, and gloves too....

Safety workboots ARE compulsory..

Do a first aid/ recussitation course just before leaving and bring the certicficate...it is a requirement and so is doing your "blue card" here...an Industrial Safety course usually costing around $80, one evening, concentrated and with an exam at the end.

As I said...keep tabs on the Internet and the "Seek" for example to check for work but don't just say "oh there is plenty of work in Australia" and fly over...it will work but may take a lot of stuffing around also......try to make contacts and send resume's before hand...big companies perhaps like Stowe or Heyday...whatever Kilpatrck Green is now, it had amalgamated......Send a letter and resume. Tell them you are coming over, when..or ask when might be a good time with up and coming projects...ask for acknowledgement and folow it up...they can plug you into the equation.....if they know what an equation means...For some of you younger blokes...

The Army in the UK might be a good place to do a trade too...I sometimes think that for all the disadvantages of this moment in history, that there are great reasons to be in the Army...as opposed to Deptment of Navy and Depair.. when it comes to everyday trasferrable electrical trades......I know there are widely differing trains of thought in this area but my experience with the armed services, during and since Vietnam has given me a view too...I have few inhibiting barriers to being topical, nor should anyone in discussing and deciding about a career and where to live and where to go and why.

I know men and women who will not join up because we are once again involved in an unjustifiable invasion and there are many like that..even in Israel where large numbers will not serve in Palestine. There is the possibility that "after Iraq" (which will adversely affect us for more than just the next thousand years)... what was not enacted after Vietnam , might happen...Politicians seeking the truth before sending young people and older people off to engage in a culture of death to inflict someone elses "enforced democracy" and deception. We might even say "sorry" and do something to recompense the utter destruction of what was a highly advanced Nation with religious freedom including Christians, now a shattered and pillaged nation with no religious freedom as the Archbishop of Canterbury was well advised by his man in Iraq.

These factors are a great part of the decline in interest in decent people having the Army as a possible career. Is that it though, the end of it...perhaps its better it is.....let them think about why people will not join up. I am unsure...but I know it is something a tradesman will be pondering when thinking "what about doing a trade in the Army".

Army guys can get some great overseas postings especially with governmental aid and disaster work. One of these days we may not be the lackies used by a tiny % of the population who are politicians in exploiting and protecting sacred cows in the middle-east or assisting NWO imperilaism where citizens protecting their country very justifiably want to drive us out, whatever it takes.. and a soldier who wants to have integrity guaranteed in his job may have that anxiety lifted ..

The Australian army does a lot of Aid work..and maybe so does the British..could be a good continuity from one to the other....We might also be able to get safe and interesting work in say Africa or Venezuala or Argentina and be an example to these countries once leaving the services as many only sign on once....so for me a young aspiring electrician could do much worse than consider the Army for that apprenticeship...or as a tradesman for 5 years. There may even be a way of joining up over here with naturalisation or with previous British Army experience. If what you are after is cold hard cash though...forget the armed services.

Cheers