New skills assessing authority

Among other things, the new instrument replaces a skills assessing authority

Work & holiday: from 500 to 2,000 places for a particular country

On 4 Nov 2019, the federal government announced it will increase the number of annual places available under the Work & Holiday visa program from 500 to 2,000 for a particular country.

Status of forces agreement

The new regulations "provide appropriate flexibility for the Schedules to the SOFA Regulations to commence when the Agreements covered by the SOFA Regulations come into force for Australia"

Immigration clearance exemption

"... the amending Regulations will allow ... to not be immigration cleared as required under section 166 of the Migration Act, so long as they do not leave the airport lounge except to continue their departure journey within 90 minutes of the arrival into Australia"

New workplace justice visa

The new Regulations "implement a new workplace justice visa that enables a temporary migrant to remain in Australia for a period of time to undertake a workplace justice activity... The Workplace Justice Visa is one component of a range of measures that the Government is introducing to address migrant worker exploitation..."

Supporting innovation in SA: instrument removed

The revoked instrument "specified, for paragraphs 408.229(b) and (c) of Schedule 2 to the Regulations, the event known as Supporting Innovation in South Australia as an ‘Australian Government endorsed event’ (AGEE) and classes of persons in relation to the event who may be eligible for a Subclass 408 (Temporary Activity) visa"

Arrangement for protection, refugee & humanitarian visas

"The purpose of the instrument is to update the arrangements for making an application for a Protection (Class XA) visa, a Temporary Protection (Class XD) visa or a Safe Haven Enterprise (Class XE) visa"

Sub 485: amendment to LIN 20/162

The instrument amends LIN 20/262 to ... The new Migration (Arrangements for Certain Skilled and Temporary Graduate Visa Applications) Amendment Instrument (LIN 20/297) 2020 commences...

Passports: identity matching

'This Bill amends the Australian Passports Act 2005 ... to provide a legal basis for ensuring that the Minister is able to make Australian travel document data available for all the purposes of, and by the automated means intrinsic to, the identity-matching services to which the Commonwealth and the States and Territories agreed in the Intergovernmental Agreement on Identity Matching Services'

Subclass 870: income test

Subclass 870 (parent) visa sponsorship applicants must show an "overall" taxable income that is above a certain amount. The overall income can be a combination of the sponsorship applicant's individual income with the income of up to 2 other persons specified in legislation. But the sponsor's individual income must also be above a certain threshold. We discuss an example where the income test is not satisfied and an example where it is.