Quote:
Originally Posted by linziloo
Hi Guys, Im just wondering in anyone elses parents have been granted a visa.
My 49 yr old mother, who is single would love to emigrate and would need to work. Just wondering if anyone else has had any experiences of this? thanks x
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Hi Linziloo
My mother is an elderly widow but she now has
PR in Oz and lives in Perth. Mum has what is called a Contributory Parent visa. (And Mum has a part time job, working at home - which is pretty good going for 87! She thinks its brill! It is more 'occupational therapy' for her than 'job' but she likes to think of it as "a job.")
It sounds like Taffy 62's Parents now also have one of the Parent visas.
All of the Parent visas carry unlimited work rights in Oz.
What does your Mum do? If by a stroke of luck she has a job on the MODL and/or an employer would be willing to say that she is crucial to running the business etc etc, it is not impossible that she would be able to get a skilled visa in her own right which could lead to
PR without needing to worry about the Parent migration route. But it does depend on her skills.
If that idea is not a goer, how many children does Mum have in total and where does each of you live? The central feature of Parent migration is the Balance of Family Test, which is described thus:
All applicants for a visa in the parent category must meet the 'balance of family’ (BoF) test. This means the applicants must have:- at least half of their children living lawfully and permanently in Australia
or
- more children living lawfully and permanently in Australia than in any other single country overseas.
Stepchildren are irrelevant unless they are under 18.
If Mum is OK on this Test then she is (or will become) eligible to apply for an offshore Parent or Contributory Parent visa.
Non contributory Parent visas have not improved much since Taffy's Parents first applied. There are now 700 visas each year and there are over 12,000 Parents in the official Queue, so the wait is about 17 years. (A complete disgrace if you ask me and it remains to be seen whether the new Minister for Immi will do something meaningful about increasing this miserable quota. An announcement is expected in the second half of May 2008.)
Contributory Parent visas are better because there are 3,500 available each year currently, and this might improve too depending on the announcement above. But they are pricey.
If Mum were able to apply for a CP visas before 30th June 2008, she would pay a total of $32,945 in non-refundable DIAC fees) plus a Bond of $10,0000 would have to be lodged with the Commonwealth Bank. The Bond is refunded in full after 10 years provided that the Parent has not made claims for State Benefits during the 10 years.
This is not as bad as it sounds. If she could apply before 30/06/08, the fee payable to DIAC for actually processing the visa application is $1,390. The request for the remainder of the money ($31,555) is the very last step before the visa is granted,
plus it is possible to split this into two chunks,
plus the Bond does not have to be deposited until just before the second chunk is paid. They do NOT ask for any big payments until they are absolutely sure that everything else is OK and that the visa will definitely be granted.
Please see the following links:
Family - Visas & Immigration
Australian Immigration Fact Sheet 34. Assurance of Support
Parent Migration Booklet
Parent Visa Charges
Nor would you necessarily have to wait until you have lived in Oz for 2 years before Mum could apply. Please see this link:
Go Matilda - Your Gateway to Australia - News
The discussion in Alan Collett's article is just as valid for Parents as it is for Contributory Parents.
If a CP visa would not be affordable in the near future, another possibility would be as follows:
Bung in an application for a non-contributory Parent subclass 103 visa as soon as you possibly can. ($1,390 up front to DIAC for that.)
All of you then save like mad. Once you are sure that there will be enough money in the potfor a CP visa instead, Mum could switch into the CPV queue withut incurring any further cost for making the switch. If by then Mum has spent (say) 5 years in the Parent Queue, she would be very high on the list for priority processing of a CPV application so she would not have to wait as long as most other CPV applicants for her own CPV to be granted.
If you can confirm whether or not Mum can meet the Balance of Family Test, I will give you all the help that I possibly can, chooks.
Best wishes
Gill
