Australian Immigration Daily News

Is there a good strategy for fighting the cancellation of a student visa?

Suppose  you have a client who has not maintained her/his enrollment in a registered course, and is therefore in breach of Condition 8202(2), which requires her/him to remain enrolled?

Will it “work” for the client to “scramble”, and get an offer of enrollment in a completely different course from the one on which the original student visa was premised?

Migration Alliance has received another report from a migration agent which suggests that the MARA has gone off the deep end yet again!!

Here’s the issue: Can a person provide “immigration assistance”, on a “free” or “pro bono” basis as a “private person” or “individual” without somehow being affiliated with a “business name”, and having a “business address” other than their home address?

You would think that this shouldn’t present the slightest issue in the world and that the answer to this question ought to be obvious as day, right?

The gods must be crazy!

Coke bottles falling out of the sky!

The planets out of alignment!

The Migration Alliance has received a very disturbing report from a Registered Migration Agent concerning conduct by “offshore” persons who are not Registered Migration Agents involving communications with Departmental officers concerning visa applications. 

As all Registered Migration Agents will be very well aware, section 280 of the Migration Act makes it a criminal offence, subject to a penalty of 80 penalty units (currently $180), or $14,400 for a person who is not a RMA to give immigration assistance.  And section 281 further provides that a person who is not a RMA may not ask for or receive any fee or other reward for giving migration assistance, and that doing so may result in a sentence of imprisonment of 10 years. 

Perhaps less familiar is section 282, which further provides that a person who is not a RMA must also not ask for or receive a fee or other reward for making “immigration representations”.  Likewise, such conduct is subject to a penalty of 10 years in prison. 

Do you think there is little you can do to help your client at a hearing before the Administrative Appeals Tribunal? 

Do you think that your role as a migration agent or lawyer at the Tribunal amounts to being nothing more than a “bump on a log” as a result of section 366A(2) of the Migration Act ­– which provides that: 

“The assistant is not entitled to present arguments to the Tribunal, or to address the Tribunal, unless the Tribunal is satisfied that, because of exceptional circumstances, the assistant should be able to do so”?