Was the “regional processing arrangement” that was entered into by the Australian government with the government of Papua New Guinea within the lawful powers of the government? 

That question was raised in a case that was brought in the High Court by an Iranian asylum seeker that was decided late last week, Plaintiff S195-2016 v Minister for Immigration and Border Protection (2017) HCA 31 (17 August 2017). 

The background of this case was that the plaintiff entered the migration zone at Christmas Island on 24 July 2013 as an “unauthorised maritime arrival”, claiming to be a refugee. 

Is a case that appears hopeless necessarily hopeless? 

We have seen in many cases over the last few years that the Department and the Minister (through exercise of personal powers not to revoke) have been engaged in a process of very routinely and broadly cancelling visas on character grounds, and that the bases on which such cancellation decisions can be challenged in Federal Court are really quite narrow. 

So what about the following situation, described in a decision of the Federal Court that was handed down last week, Coker v Minister for Immigration and Border Protection, (2017) FCA 929 (15 August 2017): 

Ross Ahmadzai, immigration lawyer and General Manager of Visacorp, has been caught up in the Barcelona terrorist attack and has reported in as SAFE.  

Unfortunately the attack occurred right outside the Hotel Catolonia, where Ross is staying.

Some of you will remember that Ross has presented on 457 visas and TSS visas at the two most recent LTA conferences, both at Wesley Centre and Westpac's Arena in Sydney.  (See pic)

The Migration Institute of Australia has, for reasons that are unclear, decided to postpone the EGM to 8 September 2017 at 4pm.

What this means is that there will need to be a new proxy form.  Please hold off on sending in the current proxy forms as these are likely to be invalid because of the sudden change of date.

We will be creating an amended proxy form and sending this to the profession.