Australian Immigration Daily News

Is there any way to salvage a client’s situation if a third party submits a bogus document or information that is false and misleading in a material particular to the Department, and Public Interest Criterion 4020 is engaged, leading to the refusal of a visa application? 

Or is PIC 4020 an insurmountable barrier, a complete “brick wall” that there is no way to get around? 

In the wake of the Full Court’s decision last week in my own case, Singh v Minister for Immigration and Border Protection, it might seem that PIC 4020 really is a brick wall. 

Is it hard to persuade the Department and the Tribunal that the Schedule 3 criteria should be “waived” so that an applicant can apply for a Subclass 820 Partner visa while onshore in Australia, and obtain a Bridging Visa A to remain in Australia with her/his spouse or partner while the application is being processed?

And is it hard to persuade the Federal Courts that the Tribunal has fallen into jurisdictional error when it has determined that “compelling reasons” do not exist for not applying the Schedule 3  criteria?

The answers to these questions are “yes!” and “YES!!!”.

How harsh is harsh? And how cruel is cruel?

Should immigration detention centres be operated on the model of prisons?

And are people who are being held in immigration detention facilities being treated with unnecessary severity?

Do you think that Public Interest Criterion 4020 should impose “strict” or “absolute” liability on a visa applicant?

Should PIC 4020 be applied as grounds for the refusal of an application when an applicant plays no role at all in the creation of a “bogus document”, and that document is in fact created and sent to the Department with the malign purpose of sabotaging or destroying the visa application?

Is it enough that an applicant gives documents to an “intermediary” to send to the Department, and that intermediary then creates the bogus document?

How important do you think it is to read every single word in a decision of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal carefully? 

Would you be prepared to accept that it is exceptionally, extremely, incredibly, unbelievably important that you do so? 

If you are not yet convinced, or even if you are convinced, keep reading!