Hello Sleeping Beauty
Welcome to Poms in Oz.
Nobody is attacking you or has tried to do so, least of all me. One the contrary, I have been doing everything I can to try to get up to date information as and when there is any and to make sure that that information is disseminated in order to try to help people like your own family amongst many others.
Quote:
incidentally, i have had a letter in reply to my letter sent to Chris Evans, advising that ".......your parents assurer may wish to withdraw th AoS bond. They can contact Centrelink and request release of the bond prior to visa grant. your parents assurer would then be required to lodge the AoS again at a later date, which may further delay processing for visa grant consideration...............".
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I am aware that this is the what the Minister's acoloytes have told a couple of people who have phoned the Minister's office complaining about the delays. The Minister's own information appears to be out of date (or that of his minions is) because the legislation was tweaked earlier this year and the result is that whereas in the past an Assurer could back out of an AoS once given, this is no longer the case. You will find the relevant provisions in the latest amendments to the Social Security Act 1991, I would think.
What with people complaining about the interest on the money, and suggestions by another of your contributors that applicants might want to complain to DIAC or to the Ombudsman, it is but a short step for somebody to think of contacting Centrelink and trying to unstitch the AoS temporarily. "Someone" many not even be a contributor to your thread or to Poms in Oz. Far more people read these threads than make any contribution to them. The ones who actually post anything on them are in a minority, I reckon, when one considers the number of hits on the various CPV threads.
You & I are trying to fight the same wicket of trying to keep everyone safe, informed and to get their visas granted as quickly as possible. I applaud your own efforts to the hilt. It is a pity, perhaps, that you seem to feel less gracious about my own identical efforts.
What the readers of other forums do is no concern of mine but I do not want readers of Poms in Oz to imagine that trying to bust the AoS temporarily would be a sensible step to take at this juncture because I believe that it would be completely counter-productive. Complaining to Centrelink would not help either because they only did what DIAC asked them to do. This is DIAC's own fiasco and nobody else is responsible for it..
If you search through the posts on here by me, you will discover that I have referred numerous CPV applicants (and those who are waiting till they can apply) to the BE CPV threads in order to let them know that there are plenty of sources of information available to them besides those which they can discover from reading BE. Why would I plug your threads publicly if I thought they were misleading rubbish?
Trust me, when these visas are eventually granted to the people like your own Parents, I shall join the clamour to get something done about ensuring that this situation does not happen again, and where Meds have to be done twice for members of the current group, I will join any campaign going to try to force DIAC to re-imburse the Parents for the money effectively wasted on getting the first lot of meds done - at DIAC's request - just before DIAC suddenly shifted the goalposts on all the applicants without a word of prior warning to any of them.
They have still not managed to put an "information strategy" into place about it either, some 3.5 months after they suddenly decided to implement the formal Queueing procedure. It seems they decided to start the Queue business during the first week in December and to do so with immediate effect, leaving many people like your own Parents "caught on the cusp" as it were. The website is still insisting that there is no Queue:
Parent Visa Processing Priorities - Family - Visas & Immigration
Why didn't they count the number of visas they had left much sooner than they seemingly did, so as to ensure that nobody would be caught on the cusp in this way? Commonsense (I would have thought) is to reserve the visas at the time when the CO first makes contact, not later on in the game. If the applicant subsequently dies/fails the meds or whatever, the "spare" visa can always go back into the pot, but not to reserve it before triggering costs on the applicant's part in the shape of meds etc seems short-sighted to me.
Personally I think the buck for all this stops with the head of DIAC's Family Section. None of it the fault of the foot soldiers at the POPC. I think that Canberra has mis-managed the whole thing, frankly, and feeble tales about a change of Government is not a viable excuse for inefficiency and mismanagement by any Civil Service Department. They are supposed to keep the balls rolling even if the Parliament building burns down and takes all the Ministers with it.
However, I am sure that I will not be alone in composing a suitably pithy letter about all this
after the current group of applicants including your own Parents have their visas safely. I could be complaining to the Minister, the Ombudsman, the DIAC complaints team, Centrelink, Federal MPS and Uncle Tom Cobley & All but I am not prepared to do or say anything which might help to trigger an Inquiry that might simply hold everything up at this delicate stage.
Incidentally, a guy who is not a contributor to either BE or Poms in Oz was kind enough to contact me recently. I think he and his wife received their CPVs in about May 2007. They now live in South Australia. He told me that since he and his wife are over 65 or whatever the relevant age is, they were given "Seniors Cards" as soon as they moved to SA. Apparently these cards enable them to get discounts in cinemas, on public transport, in restaurants, the hairdresser etc. He says they were told that it is SA's policy to issue these cards without imposing any sort of qualifying period for them, nd the official in SA said that s/he thought this is not necessarily the practice in all States.
I am not sure whether this is some sort of Card that is peculiar to SA. Before Mum's visa was granted in 2006, I tried to investigate the concessionary cards offered by Centrelink - though I am in the UK so I had to try to play Chinese Whispers with them via my sister in Perth.
First they gave Elaine a Form. They told her a yarn about completing this form and giving it to Centrelink as soon as Mum moved to Oz, claiming that it would take two years for them to get the necessary confirmation from DIAC. Which is nonsense. Surely the stamps in the person's passport provide all and any evidence that Centrelink need? Also DIAC would be in breach of their own Charter Service Standards if they took two years to come up with any necessary information, so this claim is difficult to believe. The form is on the Centrelink website somewhere but I can't remember which bit. It seems to be something to do with the two year qualifying period during which new migrants are not entitled to these Australian concessions.
The stuff about the Cards appears to be here:
A - Z Directory
It is not something that is recoverable from the Bond (the details of the Recoverable Benefits are listed under Assurance of Support, with details of each one, and I have been through that with a fine toothcomb.) Nothing relating to Health is recoverable from the Bond either.
Mum's income may be too high for any of these concessions anyway but as yet I have not investigated it closely because until I heard from the CPV holder in SA, I thought that there must be a two-year qualifying period and Mum has not lived there for 2 years as yet.
However, if Mum is eligible for one of these cards then we intend to get her one as soon as we can because anything which does not compromise the Bond but which can help to offset the reduction in the UK State Pension is worth it, I reckon, even if it only means 10% off at the hairdresser each week.
Having said that, Mum is in Perth and I believe that your Parents will be moving to either QLD or NSW? I could be on completely the wrong track in thinking that this is anything to do with Centrelink. It might be a different concession entirely, administered by the State Government in each State.
Finding out about this in relation to WA is on the "to do" list, but you do not need me to describe how long that always is! Also, SA is keen to attract new migrants so this could be a purely local incentive - I don't know. I mention it in case you want to try to investigate it for your own Parents if they are old enough to be potential candiates for it.
However, I am certain that you and I are absolutely on the same side in the same team in trying to do our best for our own Parents and all other CPV holders and applicants. Therefore we should be working together on all this instead of your trying to take potshots at me, I suggest.
Best wishes
Gill
