Promoting deadwood, limiting openness, discouraging new thinking and probably the worst thing, undermining members trust: did the MIA National Board, consider any of these when they decided to put to the vote the changes to its Constitution to remove the 2 year term limits for the tenure of MIA Directors?

They must have, and figured that given how comfortably their Directors get re-elected each time, they would also have this easily passed. They seemed to have confused their members’ patience with apathy and are undoubtedly hoping to achieve a coup for the incumbents so that they can boast the title “MIA Director” for potentially a lifetime, without ever achieving anything much for their members.

However, the reaction in some quarters to this selfish move has been swift with the resignation of MIA’s Qld/NT committee member, Sharon Harris. In a selfless open letter which would not have reached RMAs if it wasn’t for the open nature of the Migration Alliance forum, Ms Harris outlined her concerns and objections.

“In 2010 whilst I was a Director on the MIA Board, there was some criticism from members of the Board which included:  they sat on Board for their self-interest; did not represent ALL members; were committee 'junkies' and there for the kudos; did not share information with members, was a 'closed shop',“ wrote Ms Harris adding, “I cannot support unlimited tenures for directors of MIA Board - remember they are elected by us and are there to best serve our interests.”

Other dual members of the MIA and Migration Alliance are offering to volunteer their time and resources to attend the MIA’s EGM on 18 February 2015 to vote ‘No’ against the motion. Liana Allan and Christopher Levingston along with John Hourigan are taking up the main fight for a 'no' vote.

With over 4000 RMA members, Migration Alliance has a huge number of dual members.  Migration Alliance represents the majority of the RMA profession.  This means that Liana Allan could effectively collect proxies to control the outcome of the MIA's motion.

"It's disgraceful that families, including young children, are detained in shocking conditions offshore and the Australian taxpayer is left to pick up the multi-billion dollar bill," Greens immigration spokeswoman Sarah Hanson-Young recently told the Sydney Morning Herald.

Some $1.2 billion was spent last year alone to run detention centres on Manus Island, Nauru and Christmas Island, according to newly release Senate Estimate documents. This amounts to over $529,000 per detainee on Manus Island and Nauru which together currently hold about 1930 asylum seekers. The balance was spent on the Christmas Island detention centres which this year is expected to have its numbers dramatically reduced with the removal of children and their families to Darwin.

The figures were released in response to parliamentary questions and come just after the United Nations refugee agency criticised the recent High Court decision over the detainment of 157 asylum seekers on the high seas for a month. In a close 3:4 decision, the High Court ruled that the government’s action was lawful.

The government has said it plans to reduce its spending on the offshore detention centres with big cuts to welfare services this year. However, Senator Hanson-Young told The SMH,"If the government really wanted to save money, they'd shut down these multi-billion dollar gulags on Manus Island and Nauru."

During 2014 the number of people who arrived by boat to Australia significantly plunged. Last year 164 people successfully made it to Australian land to seek asylum. This is in stark contrast to the 20,719 people who successfully sought asylum by boat in 2013, according to the report.

Whistleblowers have sparked what is believed to be one of Australia’s biggest inquiries into the sc457 working visa ‘fraud’, with immigration investigators conducting a series of raids on a multi-national firm working on major Australian mining and infrastructure projects, according to a report in The Sydney Morning Herald.

Murphy Pipe & Civil (MPC), which is a major Australian pipeline company that provides the energy water and mining sectors with ‘pipeline solutions’ has reportedly had their offices raided by immigration investigators with documents and other material seized. 

The SMH reports that the firm has allegedly assisted dozens of Irish workers to fraudulently obtain 457 temporary skilled and other visas to work on key national projects, including the multi-billion dollar Queensland Curtis Liquefied Natural Gas project and Western Australia's Sino Iron project.

The raids are likely to be the first of many on major companies in the infrastructure and mining industry with questions now being raised ‘about whether some of Australia's biggest infrastructure and mining players, including the company managing the Curtis LNG project, QGC, have failed to conduct thorough due diligence on the workforces supplied by sub-contractors such as MPC.  (QGC did not respond to questions),” reports The SMH.

The chief executive of the Australian Customs and Border Protection Service, Roman Quadvlieg, told Fairfax Media a new investigations division was being created to target "entities seeking to commit visa fraud here in Australia". It will also investigate transnational organised crime syndicates. It remains unclear what sanctions these companies are expected to face if found guilty.

The SMH reports among the allegations being investigated, are how “dozens of overseas workers employed by MPC may have lied about their qualifications or job role in order to get a skilled migration visa.

With the Coalition government on the ropes with its leadership crisis, the ACTU has started flexing its muscle with a ‘scathing response’ to the government’s proposal to introduce the short-term mobility visa and relax 457 visa requirements, according to reports in The Guardian and The Sydney Morning Herald.

Australian workers will lose out from a proposed short-term working visa which will serve to benefit big employers, the Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) has said in its response to the discussion paper on skilled migration released by the department of immigration (DIBP).

DIBP has been considering relaxing entry requirements for overseas workers, including the introduction of a new short-term visa class for specialised workers to stay in Australia for up to a year.

Under this change, overseas workers would not need to apply for a 457 work visa, which imposes entry requirements including English language tests and forces employers to prove they have looked for local workers before seeking overseas labour.

The ACTU heavily criticised the proposal in DIBP’s paper to introduce a new short-term mobility visa that would allow employers to hire specialised workers for up to 12 months adding that short-term visas would erode working conditions and allow employers to bypass labour market testing (LMT), English language competency and even skills testing, according to The Guardian.

Various commentaries on the speeches of the new head of Australia’s Immigration department, Michael Pezzullo, suggest that Australia will be looking to tighten immigration policy and possibly make it more difficult for foreigners to obtain permanent residency.

Michael Pezzullo is reported to have encouraged his staff to change the way they think about the department’s role and to question whether the “waves of settlement” in Australia’s past would or should endure, according to a report in The Australian.

In an Australian day speech to his staff he reportedly said, “…we should increasingly reframe our national self-understanding and speak more of ­engaging with the world, and not just settling our land. The vestiges of insularity and living ensconced in our sheltered land, far from our ‘home’, have passed away…

“More than settlement, we should look to become Australia’s gateway to the world, and the world’s gateway to Australia. On occasions, at times of heightened threat such as caused by terrorism or pandemics, we will need to act as the gatekeepers and, as necessary, man the ramparts and protect our borders" said Mr Pezzullo.

Tony Kevin, Emeritus Fellow at Australian National University recently wrote on the website, the conversation.com that the Australian government is in the throes of a major recasting of traditional immigration and border security doctrines and institutions. The changes are being led ‘quietly’ by its new head, Mr Pezzullo who he says has hinted that “Australia is now essentially full.

“The ‘original mission of 1945 to build the population base’ has been accomplished. Now the focus is on short-term in-and-out flows as the national interest demands” observes Mr Kevin.

Mr Kevin says that there are large gaps with Mr. Pezzullo’s doctrines. It is particularly harsh towards asylum seekers who arrive independently at Australia’s maritime borders and adds that, “[Mr Pezzullo] has no words on Australia’s international good citizen role, its responsibility to protect abroad and not contribute to wars that trigger new refugee flows, or our responsibilities to observe international conventions on the law of the sea and maritime search and rescue.