Australian Immigration Daily News

Migration Alliance has received the following communications from Regional Development Australia - Orana NSW:

RDA Orana has been working on the issue of the workforce for our region and has identified that there are critical labour shortages holding back business growth.

We’ve also identified a project pipeline of $7.9 B that is a mix of mining, infrastructure, renewable energy, manufacturing and health projects between now and the next 5 years.

The Migration Program is designed to achieve a range of economic and social outcomes. The program is set on an annual basis and re-sets on 1 July each year.  For the current migration year, with the total places available capped at a ceiling of 190,000.  These figures refer to permanent migration and do not include temporary visa grants such as visitor and temporary work visas. 

The subcategories of permanent migration are broken down as follows:

1. Skill – designed to improve the productive capacity of the economy and fill skill shortages in the labour market, including those in regional Australia. This represents most places offered (128,550 places in 2018-19).
2. Family – is predominately made up of Partner visas, enabling Australians to reunite with family members from overseas, and provide them with pathways to citizenship (57,400 places in 2018-19).
3. Special Eligibility – this covers visas for those in special circumstances that do not fit into the other streams. This can include permanent residents returning to the country after a period away, and is the smallest stream (565 places in 2018-19).

Based on the above figure, Skilled Migration Continues to remain Australia’s priority, representing 68.9% of the total migration intake.

Australia has a new Migration Minister David Coleman.  Hon David Coleman is a member for Banks, New South Wales.  Prior to entering politics, Hon David Coleman worked in the private sector, principally in the media and technology industries. He was Director of Strategy and Digital and Nine Entertainment Co, Chairman of ninemsn, and held board positions with a number of other companies including Sky News and 3P Learning, the operator of the Mathletics business.   He also worked with the management consulting firm McKinsey and Co, and had his own consulting business. In his recent interview with SBS, the Minister of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs advised that regional visas will be given a priority under his portfolio.  It is also worthwhile noting that immigration portfolio no longer falls under Home Affairs Ministry. 

According to latest statistics published by Home Affairs, approximately 128,550 places were allocated to skilled migrants and of those, approximately 16,000 were regional visa grants. 

There are several consequences which are to be expected: 

Report on the Processing Status and Outcomes - August 2018 - Paper 

This report provides information on the processing status and outcomes of the applicants who are Illegal Maritime Arrivals (IMAs) and are in the IMA Legacy Caseload.

IMAs can only apply for a Temporary Protection Visa (subclass 785) (TPV) or a Safe Haven Enterprise Visa (subclass 790) (SHEV) if the Minister has made a decision that it is in the public interest to lift a legislative bar on making a valid visa application in Australia. 

Where the Minister lifts the bar, the Department will advise the IMA that they are eligible to apply for a TPV or a SHEV.

Source: IMA-legacy-caseload-Aug-2018.pdf

On Wednesday 29 September, the Department of Home Affairs updated their information on the current parent visa scheme framework.  Home Affairs confirmed that the following numbers of visas are available under contributory and non-contributory parent visa scheme:

In the 2018–19 Migration Programme year: 

• 1 500 places have been allocated to Parent (non-contributory) visas (subclasses 103 and 804)
• 7 175 places have been allocated to Contributory Parent visas (subclasses 173/143 and subclasses 884/864). 

In the current Migration Programme year, 1 500 Parent (non-contributory) visa places are available for applicants applying from in and outside Australia. These types of visas are assessed in order of lodgement, assigned a queue date and then placed in the queue for the relevant visa subclass. The queue date is the date that the application was assessed as meeting the initial criteria for a Parent (non-contributory) visa. When a queue date has been assigned it is a fixed date and the application cannot be given priority ahead of other applications. Applications are finalised in order of their queue date as places become available. Based on current planning levels, applicants for a Parent (non-contributory) visa can expect an approximate 30 year wait before visa grant.