Legislation Updates
Migration Legislation Tracker
A single source about the status of pieces of legislation, Bills, commencement dates, disallowances, etc
Direction No 84
Direction No 84 revokes Direction No 56: 'The purpose of this Direction is to guide decision makers performing functions or exercising powers under section 65, 414 or 415 of the Act when considering an application for the grant of a Protection visa and when reviewing a decision to grant a Protection visa.'
Wide-range identity matching
'The [Bill] will facilitate the secure, automated and accountable exchange of identity information between the Commonwealth and state and territory governments, pursuant to the objectives of the Intergovernmental Agreement on Identity Matching Services (IGA), agreed by COAG in October 2017. The Bill will achieve this by providing explicit legal authority for the Department of Home Affairs ... to collect, use and disclose identification information'
Case Law Updates
Complementary protection despite unidentifiable risk?
Federal Court (Full Court): could it be said that it "may be that a complementary protection claim could be based upon prevailing circumstances in a country of a kind that would expose a particular returnee to a risk of harm, even though there is no identified reason why the applicant for a protection visa might be targeted"?
Another attempt to distinguish Ibrahim
Federal Court: The Full Court had decided in Ibrahim that the Minister had conflated Australia's non-refoulment obligations under international law with the protection obligations under the Migration Act 1958 (Cth). The Minister sought to distinguish Ibrahim on the basis that, here, he had accepted the findings made by an ITOA regarding non-refoulment obligations and had considered the Appellant's claim of harm "outside of the concept of non-refoulement", thus suggesting that there had been no conflation.
Can a mere assertion of fact amount to a denial?
Federal Court (Full Court): In her visa cancellation revocation request, the Respondent made an "uncontentious assertion" that the sentencing remarks relating to her most recent convictions made no reference to whether those convictions involved drug use. The Minister took that assertion as a denial that those convictions were drug related and inferred that, because of the denial, she was likely to re-offend. Should the Minister have put the Respondent on notice that her "uncontentious assertion" would be critical to his decision?
Industry Updates
Visas affected by the new regional visas
8 existing visa types are adversely affected by the new subclass 491 and 494 regional visas. If a subclass 491/494 visa is (or has been) held by a client, that client might not be eligible for any of those 8 existing visa types and might not even be eligible for a BVA. However, those 8 existing visas are not affected in the same way. As a result, it is not enough to understand Schedules 1 and 2 for the new visas. It is also necessary to understand how those new visas could affect each of those 8 existing visas types.
457/186/187 grandfathering provisions: Part 1
If Schedules 1 and 2 of the Migration Regulations 1994 (Cth) no longer contain the provisions for visa class UC, subclass 457, how can that type of visa still be granted?
Changes to partner visa in November 2019
From November 2019, a person who holds certain types of visas (or whose last substantive visa held was of one of those types) will only be able to make a valid subclass 820 application if, before making that application, they have either held those types of visas for at least 3 years or obtain another substantive visa.
Media Updates
Cutting permanent migration by 120,000 places over 4 years
'First, the government is cutting the permanent migration program by a cumulative 120,000 places over four years. The new cap is 160,000 per annum, down from the cap of 190,000. The average intake over the last five years has been 183,000... Second, the government is introducing strong incentives for new international students to choose locations outside of the big capital cities'.
Government to ‘abandon’ plans for stricter citizenship test?
"The Australian Government may not be pursuing changes to the Australian citizenship law - that would make permanent residents wait longer and require evidence of their English proficiency before they can apply"
More work & holiday visas available to Singaporeans
'From 1 July 2019, the number of Work and Holiday visas available to Singaporean citizens aged 18-30 will increase from 500 to 2,500 per year'