Can you get a bridging visa while waiting for a 176 with SS??

[twosouls]

Aloha Group..
I’ve gotten in a bit of a pickle and I am hoping someone might know the next best route..
Quite a while ago, I purchased a home here in Australia. To get my initial visa, I dealt with and visited too many migration agents/solicitors here in Australia and paid quite a bit of money for not much advice.. I was traveling in and out of the country on a tourist visa and was stopped at the airport one day. I was threatened to be kicked out because it was looking like I was trying to permanently live here. In other words, I was allowed by the government to buy a home on a tourist visa, but that set up flags that I was trying to live here. I was able to show everything I had done up to that point to get a visa and demonstrated the run around I was getting with migration agents, etc… Because I had it well documented that I had actually tried getting a proper visa, I was given an ultimatum. The option was to get a proper visa in the next 3 months, or get out of the country.
I’m here in Australia now on a 457 visa. The company I work for is run by two brothers. When I started the job, the two brothers ended up having issues/words about the business and pretty much split. I got stuck in the middle of the family quarrel and the main brother of the company pretty much just let it fall apart. It has been put on my shoulders to continually bring in money for the business to pay for my life here, or risk having to move on as the two brothers in the company aren’t going to bother.
I have now spent money for my 457 visa, for ACS certification, 176 Visa application, and more. I did manage to get SS from NSW and was hoping that it would be my golden ticket to finally get PR here in Oz and not be tied to a business ever again (especially a family business).. I have been here for 2.5 years now and with owning a home and having my whole life here, I have a lot to lose.. I don’t want to leave Oz as I’ve always wanted to make a life here and I truly feel there is no place better in the world for me to live.
With the financial issues in the country, the business I’m working for will probably be closing doors soon.. So today I went to the University to look at classes so I could switch to a student visa. I already have a Uni degree, but am willing to do anything to pass time till my 176 visa gets approved.. If that ever happens due to the reprioritizing of us 176 SS people..
I was thinking about it and wanted to know if it would be possible to get a bridging visa till my 176 gets approved or declined? I am a self funded retiree, and can live on my funds for however long as need be.. So that wouldn’t be an issue for me.. I just really want to get away from the business I’m with.. I’ll pre-empt this before someone says, “go find another sponsor”.. I’m living in rural NSW where there aren’t a lot of people willing to pay someone $60,000 a year for IT skills.. I was lucky the first time around (so I thought).. So any advice would be greatly appreciated..
Thanks and aloha
Gary

[brady1967]

hi gary.. in answer to your question there is no bridging visa for a subclass 176 visa because the 176 is classed as a offshore visa and you have to go offshore when the visa is granted. so in your situation i would be looking at continuing on a 457 if i could, as the student visa can be quite expensive and there are work limitations.

thanks
brady1967

[wanderer]

Hi gary,
As Brady indicates, a bridging visa is not an option for a 176 visa, but first with the 176, did you get ACS certification that puts you on the CSL for if that is so, a 176 should not be all that far off.
Maybe you can just head off to fill in time alternating between Bali, Malaysia and Thailand where living in a thatched hut on a beach can be pretty cheap - I know of thousands who would love to have the option.

And another thought that comes to mind is seeing as the bros are letting the business go down the gurglar, though I haven't looked at it much [and costs to be invested may be too huge] is a business visa an option, perhaps you could get the business for a song, keep it strong/build it up and when your 176 does come through you could look at putting it on the market to recoup some of your investment.

I know I'd opt for the beach plan.

[twosouls]

Thanks for letting me know that I don't qualify for a bridging visa.. That's not what I was hoping to hear, but with my luck it was what I was expecting..
Unfortunately the people at ACS took the money and didn't bother looking at anything.. I came into the country as a Systems Manager for the business I'm working for so they just put me down as a "systems manager" on my certification.. Didn't call any references in regards to my past work and didn't look at my Uni degree or certificates.. Unfortunately systems manager is not on the CSL..

As for the beach idea.. Not too bad.. I lived most of my life in Hawaii and then moved to Fiji to be closer to Australia and to retire.. I sold up in Fiji and moved to Oz after Fiji's the last coup, as it was too unsafe to live there.. Now I'm on the coast in Oz.. Can't beat it and don't need to visit any more beach places :) Good thought though...

Thanks again for the advice..
Aloha for now
Gary

[ptlabs]

hi gary.. in answer to your question there is no bridging visa for a subclass 176 visa because the 176 is classed as a offshore visa and you have to go offshore when the visa is granted.

Hi Brady1967,

A 176 is an offshore visa, yes. However, if the primary applicant is a NZ citizen in Australia on a special category visa, he or she (and family members) will not need to leave Australia to be granted that visa.

Of course, this bit of trivia has no impact on the original poster's question, but just thought I'd mention it.

Regards
Peter

[Gollywobbler]

Hi Brady1967,

A 176 is an offshore visa, yes. However, if the primary applicant is a NZ citizen in Australia on a special category visa, he or she (and family members) will not need to leave Australia to be granted that visa.

Of course, this bit of trivia has no impact on the original poster's question, but just thought I'd mention it.

Regards
Peter

Hi Peter

Lovely to see you posting on here again.

Times is hard for our members right now, as you probably know.

They might not be so bad for your IT occupations clients if most of them are on the CSL?

However it is really very hard for families with non-CSL occupations who rushed around and got State sponsorship because they trusted the Minister in Dec 2008, March 2009 and right up to 23rd September when he continually assured them that State sponsorship would ensure fast track visa processing for them.

What is emerging is that applying for skilled independent migration to Oz has turned into a game of chance - of the variety usually found in casinos where the dice are invariably heavily weighted in favour of the House. The Minister changes the goalposts every 10 minutes with no prior warning. He does not provide enough factual information up front to enable potential applicants to make a fully and properly informed choice about whether to apply for migration to Oz or not. He seems to think that keeping the applicants in the factual dark whilst shifting the goalposts on them every time he has a change of whim is lawful.

My gut instinct is that this is not lawful conduct because it is not a level playing field between the visa applicant and the Minister.

I have a gut feeling..... I sense the word "tortfeasance" though that is not the exact legal concept that I am looking for.

The vernacular version of the civil law wrong which I am trying to identify is called, "B*ggering your prospective buyer about WITHOUT first discharging your own duty of care to provide him with enough facts and figures about Australia's situation to enable him to make a properly informed choice about whether to bother to apply to migrate to Australia or not." If my hunch is right then the remedy is for the Aussie Government to agree to treat the visa application as not having been made and to refund every dime of the money spent in applying for the thing in the first place.

Theoretically the Migration Act gives the Minister massive powers to tweak the policy his Department's activities etc and the aggrieved applicant has no remedy.

But what if you can convince the Court - on balance of probability, based on the available evidence - that the Minister has not been acting rationally and reasonably? In that situation, is there a way to challenge an irrational & unreasonable Minister for Immi?

The Head of Legal at DIAC is Robyn Bicket. She was on telly for a while this morning. The Minister overruled her. I was equally unimpressed, frankly. It was to do with a boat owned & skippered by DIAC, operating in the Torres Strait. It seems that the boat capsized or similar, 5 people died and the question is compensating the families of the 3 dead passengers who were not DIAC staff members but Torres Straits Islanders, it seemed.

Ms Bicket wittered about the Statute of Limitations. She is waiting to hear from the Attorney General about that, she said. Time seems to be immaterial to her. The fact that the 3 families haven't received a farthing in hard cash to enable them to cope with their dire financial circumstances - which would not have become dire if their loved ones had not died as a result of being forced to go to sea in a boat owned and operated by DIAC - had not even occurred to the woman.

The Minister gave her a sharp & public ticking off, quite rightly, at the insistence of Senator Trood (good for him.) The Minister was seen to tell Ms Bicket that he (suddenly) wants this issue resolved and the families compensated on the basis of that which is morally right, regardless of the strict legal position.

The Minister's instinct is right. The Law in a given society is that society's servant, not its master. However Ms Bicket has evidently advised him that he can cling to the textbook in the situation you and I are discussing as well instead of doing what is morally right.

Where is the difference?

Many thanks

Gill