Albanese government's tough new rules to crack down on 'visa hopping' migrants
People who abuse Australia's temporary migrant system by 'hopping from visa to visa' will face new roadblocks under rules proposed by the Albanese government.
From Friday, many international students and graduates will face new restrictions on bringing partners or children into Australia.
PhD students, foreign or Australian government scholarship holders and those from ASEAN or Pacific nations will be exempt, but will only be able to add dependants when their visa is granted.
Overseas students must also pay around $1,200 for a new visa if they want to change university courses, according to the new rules.
International students have been able to switch courses after completing six months of study, but the reforms temporarily extend that period to 12 months until the new visa requirement is expected to come into force in July next year.
Temporary migrants who are already in Australia, like people on working holidaymaker or temporary employer visas, will be blocked from applying for student visas.
The suite of measures come after a wide-ranging list of changes was introduced by Immigration Minister Tony Burke at the National Press Club in September.
Assistant Minister for International Education Julian Hill said the new rules were designed to stop 'visa hopping', according to the Australian Financial Review.
Overseas students must pay around $1,200 for a new visa if they want to change university courses, and many will face new restrictions on bringing partners or children with them. Pictured, students at the University of Sydney's Camperdown campus
Assistant Minister Julian Hill spoke about the measures on Friday, saying they will stop people from 'hopping from visa to visa' and abusing Australia's migration system
'One of the biggest problems has been the growth in permanently temporary migrants,' Hill said during a keynote address at the Migration Institute of Australia in Sydney on Friday.
'People who hop from visa to visa, who may have spent most of their adult lives here, with kids who are now Australian, but who will never make the cut for skilled migration or who wait for years on bridging visas for a permanent visa.
'When Australians go to another country, they do not believe they have some God-given right to hop around from visa to visa for years or decades and game other nations' appeals and court systems, and neither should guests in our country.'
Hill also warned migration agents and lawyers against attempting to undermine the migration system by lodging visa claims without merit.
He called out online advertisements 'that appear to coach people on how to claim they are bisexual when they're not, or how to convince the department they're being persecuted when they're not, in order to support a protection claim'.
'That's not legal representation. It's a misuse of the migration system for profit,' he said.
'Ultimately, I do not have confidence in the policy regime around how lawyers interact with the migration system.'
Almost 688,000 international students studied in Australia in the year to June, with a quarter of those students coming from China, followed by India, Nepal, Vietnam and Bangladesh.
Despite the significant figures, the rate of student visa rejections has soared to 35 per cent, up from 23 per cent in the same period last year, according to data from the Department of Home Affairs.
The overhaul of student visa rules comes as the Albanese government attempts to bring net overseas migration down from almost 300,000 a year to a target of 225,000 by 2028.
Under the sweeping reforms, parameters around the skilled migration program will also be tightened.
Priority will be given to those working in healthcare, construction, teaching, resources, agriculture, aquaculture and fishing.
