Visa Capping - Senate Inquiry

[SHANO7]

Cheers Gill

 

Lets hope that all Jobs will be ok now then if lodged.

 

Thanks for your help.

 

Again

 

Shane

[Guest Mongobear]

Hi Shane

 

You have applied for a visa in Class VE, which includes the sc 175 and the sc 176. S39 says that the Minister can cap & cease all the remainder of the applications for, say, sc 176 visas if he wants to. However if he does that, he will be getting rid of applicants whom he wants to keep as well as applicants whom he wants to get rid of. It is an "all or nothing" provision. Which fact makes the use of S39 self-limiting because Australia would not thank any Government for getting rid of skilled visa applicants that Australia wishes to encourage.

 

 

 

Well, I don't know how easy this would be, but it could happen the same that has to the poor pre. Sept. '07 guys: Chrissi could create some new visa subclasses for skilled migration in one or two years time and process all the applications in the (then old) subclass 17x or 88x that he determines to be important for his Australia.

The rotting rest will be handed down the queue again and again to finally decide that they are in demand like a hole in the head and that leaving them in limbo for another indefinite period of time would be absolutely "inhumane". Cap applied, letter sent ... enjoy your life elsewhere.

But honestly, what are the other options for those that already applied ? Chrissi once said in the Peter Mares interview that there are people in the queue that will never ever make it into the country - not in 20, not in 30 years. I don't think he just said this in jest. He has all the powers he needs to leave any application he dislikes in the queue for eternity. Please correct me if I'm wrong. We're at his (almost not existing) mercy and I'm sure he knows (and probably loves) that.

[Guest proud2beaussie]

Hi Gill,

Isn't there something in the act,some sundivision,which says that the minister must deal with applications for visas in an efficient,timely manner?.

I'm sure I saw that when reading the Migration Act recently?.

Cheers

Nigel

[Guest fat]

Hi Nigel

 

I'd risk it. I think Abbott pulling the strings is less of a risk than letting the Trades Unions pull the strings, myself.

 

The Liberal-Coalition group have always been capitalist as I understand it. I gather that Howard was also beady with the piggy-bank and left a large surplus lying about for a rainy day. If so, that sort of "kitchen sink economics" appeals to most women - I don't know about men. I think women like the security of knowing that we have put something by in case we should ever need it.

 

I gather that Rudd spent all the money - mainly on hare brained ideas that turned into bungles - and that he also borrowed heavily in order to perpetuate the bungles. Sooner or later, Australia will have to put that profligacy right.

 

Rudd's idea was to grab the profits from the mines via tax. Gillard seems to have realised that that was not a solution and that it would cause Labor to lose the next Election.

 

However neither side seems to have discussed how they propose to reduce the budget deficit? Immigration is a better red herring, no doubt, but Australia really doesn't have a major Immigration problem. Immigration is just a a convenient scapegoat on which to blame unemployment, I suspect. If I were an Aussie Voter, I'd be nailing my local Parliamentary candidates to the floor and asking them what their various Parties proposes to do by way of reducing the budget deficit?

 

Anyone whingeing to me about carbon emissions would be shown to the door. That is another red herring in my view and it is a disgraceful gravy train for all the people who prat about in that field. In the UK, a man who was trained as a Railway Engineer is in charge of climate change, apparently. Loads of huge Grants from the EU gravy train and from various worthy Foundations in the States have disappeared into companies controlled by the railway engineer, apparently. We know that the Earth tilts on its axis. It goes through a tilt of about 33 degrees, apparently. I don't know how long the cycle takes - I think it is at least 100 years. However it is known that this tilting does affect the world's climate. So why are we worrying about very dubious 'research' claiming that all the glaciers in the Himalayas are about to melt instead of figuring out where the Earth is on its axis and what effect that is likely to have?

 

Cheers

 

Gill

 

 

Labor has apparantely struck a deal with the greens and the greens will press for a carbon tax and open borders if labor is returned to power.. open borders means more humantarian places and a reduction in Skilled Migrants.. and we all know how labor plans to achieve that..

[Guest Gollywobbler]

Well, I don't know how easy this would be, but it could happen the same that has to the poor pre. Sept. '07 guys: Chrissi could create some new visa subclasses for skilled migration in one or two years time and process all the applications in the (then old) subclass 17x or 88x that he determines to be important for his Australia.

The rotting rest will be handed down the queue again and again to finally decide that they are in demand like a hole in the head and that leaving them in limbo for another indefinite period of time would be absolutely "inhumane". Cap applied, letter sent ... enjoy your life elsewhere.

But honestly, what are the other options for those that already applied ? Chrissi once said in the Peter Mares interview that there are people in the queue that will never ever make it into the country - not in 20, not in 30 years. I don't think he just said this in jest. He has all the powers he needs to leave any application he dislikes in the queue for eternity. Please correct me if I'm wrong. We're at his (almost not existing) mercy and I'm sure he knows (and probably loves) that.

 

Hi Uli

 

The solution is very simple, in my view. Instead of pandering to the whims of the Aussie voters like a bunch of lost sheep, it is time for the Australian Government to behave as if it were a Government, rather than acting like a political party that will say and do anything in order to get itself re-elected.

 

Sometimes, a genuine statesman has to stand up and tell his countrymen that the Government has made mistakes in the past but the Government cannot behave in a dishonourable fashion by trying to air-brush those mistakes out of Australia's history. Behaving dishonourably would do nothing to improve Australia's reputation on the global stage.

 

In order to attract skilled workers such as doctors and nurses in the future, Australia has to be seen to act with both honour and honesty. The doctors and nurses are in demand all over the world. They are very unlikely to be willing to deal with a Government which has treated other visa applicants very badly.

 

Therefore, in my opinion, the solution is an Amnesty. It is perfectly simple to draw a line in the sand, accept past mistakes and process ALL of the outstanding applications for GSM visas according to the rules that were in place at the time when the visa applicants proffered - and DIAC accepted - their visa application fees.

 

Yes, it would mean a one-off increase in the size of the skilled migrant intake for one year. Big deal. One year's worth of extra migrants will not produce a population of 43 million or whatever figure Abbott is wittering about, In the short term, people will moan but they will only moan for a couple of days. They will soon forget about today's Big Whinge and start on tomorrow's Even Bigger Whinge instead.

 

Most of the voters are decent-minded folk who would readily agree that it is wrong to take somebody's money, raise his legitimate expectations and then stitch him up, especially whilst declining to return 100% of his money plus interest.

 

The number of skilled migrants can be cut to 10 people a year in future years if the Government so wishes, provided that the 10 are chosen from people who apply for their visas AFTER the new legislation that would be necessary has been enacted.

 

However there is no honourable way to fix the present backlog other by granting an Amnesty, so the Aussie Government should be seen to accept that and to live with it, I suggest.

 

Granting Immigration Amnesties is not a new idea, It has been done in Australia at least 3 times before and it has been done in NZ at least once before.

 

JSTOR: An Error Occurred Setting Your User Cookie

 

Amnesty experience in Australia, 1976-77 / by Des Storer and Arthur Faulkner | National Library of Australia

 

Refugees stage hunger strike against immigration crackdown in New Zealand

 

I dont know the details but I had a chat with my sister, Elaine, recently. She went to Oz on a 12 month working holiday visa in 1979/80, when she was 21. She came back to the UK briefly in about 1984 and said that she had decided to stay in Oz "for a while longer." I took that to mean that she had secured some sort of further, temporary working visa but I didn't bother to enquire. I then went to Oz to see her about 20 months later, at Christmas 1985. She told me then that she had secured Permanent Residency but since I was not interested in moving to Australia myself, I didn't ask about how. She was living with her Aussie BF by then but they did not get married until 1989, when my parents went out to Oz to visit for 12 months. Apparently they decided that they had better make the whole thing "respectable" as far as Mum & Dad were concerned, so they go married a couple of weeks after Mum & Dad got there.

 

I knew that Elaine got PR in her own right before she married Neil, even though he is an Aussie. I did not know how Elaine had obtained PR until recently. I asked her a few weeks ago. She said that in 1980, there was a general Amnesty and that anybody who happened to be in Oz on a temporary visa - or was an illegal non-citizen with no valid, current visa - was offered PR in Australia. She made enquiries and discovered that as the holder of a Working Holiday visa she was eligible to apply for PR under this Amensty, so she applied and was granted PR.

 

She said that she had been in two minds about whether to stay in Oz long term at the time when she returned to the UK for 6 weeks in 1984, but after that visit she returned to Oz and decided to stay there for good, by which time she already had PR anyway.

 

I knew that Elaine did not become an Aussie Citizen until 1987, so how had she managed to leave Oz and then return in 1984? Elaine said that it was simple. She was a PR, she had already been living in Oz for almost 5 years and that there was no problem, She became an Aussie Citizen in 1987 because her British passport had expired and she decided that it was easier just to get dual Citizenship than to mess abuot with Resident Return Visas in the future. She said that she did have one RRV and then she became a Citizen of Oz.

 

Beyond that, Elaine said that she doesn't really know why the 1980 Amnesty was offered. She said that she was merely aware that PR was offered via this Amnesty and so, being a canny 22 year old, she decided to grab it in order to keep her options open for the future.

 

I then did a bit of sleuthing on Google, recently, to try to find out about the 1980 Amnesty. I found very little but from the small amount that I did find, I suspect that at the time there were a lot of unlawful non-citizens in Oz. The Govt seems to have decided to legalise all of them and to make a pre-emptive strike against the idea that other people such as Elaine might also become visa overstayers in the future. Either that or they wanted to boost the population of Permanent Residents in order to get them to pay tax in Australia, I imagine.

 

If you search the internet and try to find out more about why these Amnesties have happened in Oz, you might discover more than I have discovered about them.

 

However the precedent definitely exists and it could be used in order to fix the mess in the GSM visa program. The only thing that is missing is the political will to stand up to the voters and do it. DIAC can soon dust off their archives and recall how to do it if the Government decided on this course of action. If their paper work is so old that it is obsolete, the Aussie Govermment employs plenty of lawyers who could work it out all over again.

 

Cheers

 

Gill

[electrical guy]

Hi Uli

 

The solution is very simple, in my view. Instead of pandering to the whims of the Aussie voters like a bunch of lost sheep, it is time for the Australian Government to behave as if it were a Government, rather than acting like a political party that will say and do anything in order to get itself re-elected.

 

Sometimes, a genuine statesman has to stand up and tell his countrymen that the Government has made mistakes in the past but the Government cannot behave in a dishonourable fashion by trying to air-brush those mistakes out of Australia's history. Behaving dishonourably would do nothing to improve Australia's reputation on the global stage.

 

In order to attract skilled workers such as doctors and nurses in the future, Australia has to be seen to act with both honour and honesty. The doctors and nurses are in demand all over the world. They are very unlikely to be willing to deal with a Government which has treated other visa applicants very badly.

 

Therefore, in my opinion, the solution is an Amnesty. It is perfectly simple to draw a line in the sand, accept past mistakes and process ALL of the outstanding applications for GSM visas according to the rules that were in place at the time when the visa applicants proffered - and DIAC accepted - their visa application fees.

 

Yes, it would mean a one-off increase in the size of the skilled migrant intake for one year. Big deal. One year's worth of extra migrants will not produce a population of 43 million or whatever figure Abbott is wittering about, In the short term, people will moan but they will only moan for a couple of days. They will soon forget about today's Big Whinge and start on tomorrow's Even Bigger Whinge instead.

 

Most of the voters are decent-minded folk who would readily agree that it is wrong to take somebody's money, raise his legitimate expectations and then stitch him up, especially whilst declining to return 100% of his money plus interest.

 

The number of skilled migrants can be cut to 10 people a year in future years if the Government so wishes, provided that the 10 are chosen from people who apply for their visas AFTER the new legislation that would be necessary has been enacted.

 

However there is no honourable way to fix the present backlog other by granting an Amnesty, so the Aussie Government should be seen to accept that and to live with it, I suggest.

 

Granting Immigration Amnesties is not a new idea, It has been done in Australia at least 3 times before and it has been done in NZ at least once before.

 

JSTOR: An Error Occurred Setting Your User Cookie

 

Amnesty experience in Australia, 1976-77 / by Des Storer and Arthur Faulkner | National Library of Australia

 

Refugees stage hunger strike against immigration crackdown in New Zealand

 

I dont know the details but I had a chat with my sister, Elaine, recently. She went to Oz on a 12 month working holiday visa in 1979/80, when she was 21. She came back to the UK briefly in about 1984 and said that she had decided to stay in Oz "for a while longer." I took that to mean that she had secured some sort of further, temporary working visa but I didn't bother to enquire. I then went to Oz to see her about 20 months later, at Christmas 1985. She told me then that she had secured Permanent Residency but since I was not interested in moving to Australia myself, I didn't ask about how. She was living with her Aussie BF by then but they did not get married until 1989, when my parents went out to Oz to visit for 12 months. Apparently they decided that they had better make the whole thing "respectable" as far as Mum & Dad were concerned, so they go married a couple of weeks after Mum & Dad got there.

 

I knew that Elaine got PR in her own right before she married Neil, even though he is an Aussie. I did not know how Elaine had obtained PR until recently. I asked her a few weeks ago. She said that in 1980, there was a general Amnesty and that anybody who happened to be in Oz on a temporary visa - or was an illegal non-citizen with no valid, current visa - was offered PR in Australia. She made enquiries and discovered that as the holder of a Working Holiday visa she was eligible to apply for PR under this Amensty, so she applied and was granted PR.

 

She said that she had been in two minds about whether to stay in Oz long term at the time when she returned to the UK for 6 weeks in 1984, but after that visit she returned to Oz and decided to stay there for good, by which time she already had PR anyway.

 

I knew that Elaine did not become an Aussie Citizen until 1987, so how had she managed to leave Oz and then return in 1984? Elaine said that it was simple. She was a PR, she had already been living in Oz for almost 5 years and that there was no problem, She became an Aussie Citizen in 1987 because her British passport had expired and she decided that it was easier just to get dual Citizenship than to mess abuot with Resident Return Visas in the future. She said that she did have one RRV and then she became a Citizen of Oz.

 

Beyond that, Elaine said that she doesn't really know why the 1980 Amnesty was offered. She said that she was merely aware that PR was offered via this Amnesty and so, being a canny 22 year old, she decided to grab it in order to keep her options open for the future.

 

I then did a bit of sleuthing on Google, recently, to try to find out about the 1980 Amnesty. I found very little but from the small amount that I did find, I suspect that at the time there were a lot of unlawful non-citizens in Oz. The Govt seems to have decided to legalise all of them and to make a pre-emptive strike against the idea that other people such as Elaine might also become visa overstayers in the future. Either that or they wanted to boost the population of Permanent Residents in order to get them to pay tax in Australia, I imagine.

 

If you search the internet and try to find out more about why these Amnesties have happened in Oz, you might discover more than I have discovered about them.

 

However the precedent definitely exists and it could be used in order to fix the mess in the GSM visa program. The only thing that is missing is the political will to stand up to the voters and do it. DIAC can soon dust off their archives and recall how to do it if the Government decided on this course of action. If their paper work is so old that it is obsolete, the Aussie Govermment employs plenty of lawyers who could work it out all over again.

 

Cheers

 

Gill

Most of the voters are decent-minded folk who would readily agree that it is wrong to take somebody's money, raise his legitimate expectations and then stitch him up, especially whilst declining to return 100% of his money plus interest.

hope for that if next immi minster have same moral values as decent oz

[Guest Gollywobbler]

Hi Gill,

Isn't there something in the act,some sundivision,which says that the minister must deal with applications for visas in an efficient,timely manner?.

I'm sure I saw that when reading the Migration Act recently?.

Cheers

Nigel

 

Hi Nigel

 

I'm not sure. Several months ago I was browsing through the Immigration cases on AustLii. I came across one where a guy had been granted an offshore skilled visa. He then got married and broke his shoulder before he went to Australia to validate the visa.

 

The Act says that if there is a material change of circumstances prior to validation of the visa, the Minister must be notified. That is either S104 or S124 of the Act. As far as I can remember, the man went to Australia and DIAC later tried to cancel his visa, based on non-disclosure of a material change in circumstances.

 

It ended up in one of the Tribunals or the Court, with the man fighting against the visa cancellation. It was not clear to me whether the Minister was more upset because the guy had not mentioned his marriage or because he had broken his shoulder without discussing that with the Minister (ie with DIAC.)

 

The man said that his shoulder was just an accident and that it would get better. As for his marriage, that need not have taken place between the visa being granted and the validation except for the fact that DIAC had dragged their feet about processing the visa application. If the application had been processed promptly, the guy would have validated his visa before he even met his future wife, apparently. So the unfortunate timing of the marriage was the Minister's own fault.

 

As I say, I can't remember whether the case was in a court or in one of the Tribunals but whoever was in charge rejected the argument that the Minister had dragged his feet. I gathered that the Minister is allowed to take as long as he likes about processing a visa application because he receives a lot of them and it is not realistic to imagine that he has enough staff to be able to process an application as soon as it is received.

 

The recent e-mails from the ASPC and the GSMB seem to confirm the idea that the Minister is allowed to take as long as he likes, so I assume that the Act does not suggest anything else but I have not read the Act in detail so I don't know what it says. Generally, though, a statute like the Migration Act is usually likely to say that the visa applicant must not drag his feet without saying anything about whether that idea applies to the Minister as well.

 

Cheers

 

Gill

[electrical guy]

Generally, though, a statute like the Migration Act is usually likely to say that the visa applicant must not drag his feet without saying anything about whether that idea applies to the Minister as well

 

me too assume this is the last point of legal defend if one could have in general thought .becoz then they will have no dispute on fairness by defying applicant's compromise to cash value over injustice and this will provide a proof of the foul and true victims:no: who are not deserve for what they are claiming on the behalf of HONEST AUSTRALIA

[Kokki]

Hi Kokki,

 

Could you kindly put up the email addresses for the above programmes...I will email them as well and get a dozen of my pals to email them as well.... I guess when they recieve loads of such emails they may pay a bit more attention :daydreaming:

 

Go to the following link

ABC News - Australia - News from around Australia

You will find at the bottom of that link icons which represent different programs. I clicked on all of them. When you click on one, you will either get an 'contact us' email or a web form you can fill out.

World News Australia has a similar process.

Here are some of them from my hotmail account.

7.30Syd@your.abc.net.au

4corners@your.abc.net.au

rcaffaudience@your.abc.net.au

foreign2@your.abc.net.au

Lateline@abc.net.au

Christine.Heard@sbs.com.au

 

Whilst I know that the bill has been discontinued for now, it is worth raising these issues still, perhaps even ask them what would they do if elected and if this bill is reintroduced (thx for the advice proud2baussie).

[Kokki]

Hi Kokki

 

I share your opinion about the cultcha. A few years ago, I went to Perth and I was so bored that I cut short a 5 week visit to my sister. She was tied up with her second son, who was born a week after I arrived so we didn't go anywhere that time, because of the baby.

 

I don't have any children and I'm a career woman. Suburban Perth was just too boring to bother with, so I left after 3 weeks and spent 2 magical weeks in Malaysia on the way back to the UK instead.

 

As for the accent, forget it. I fail to understand how the Aussies have managed to mangle an ancient and beautiful language. I am told that the new Cap & Kill Bill will enable them "to better manage and more flexibly target" something or other. Are they REAL? That does not meet any standard of adequate English that I know of.

 

I went into a shop in Perth one day. A dreadful redneck of a bloke told me, "Yew speak the Queen's English. I car nunnerstan yew." I thought, "You ill-mannered little creep. There is no way that I am prepared to spend even one cent in your shop, considering your rudeness. As for English, there is nothing wrong with mine. It is a shame that the same cannot be said for your own." With that thought, I left his emporium.

 

Cheers

 

Gill

 

Hi Gill,

 

That is funny yet sad. I mean Aust is nothing more than a British colony and migrants (who also arrived by boat). It's either that or the 2% population of the real Australians - the Aboriginal people.

Can you please help me find the appropriate link or any starting point of obtaining information to perhaps migrating to the UK?

Cheers,

[Guest proud2beaussie]

Hi Gill,

I did a bit of reading and found that the act does have a subdivision,,Section AB,entitled

"Code of practice for dealing fairly,efficiently and quickly with visa applications" but unfortunately

it doesn't appear to impose any duty on the minister to do any such thing !at least not from what

I could see,but then I'm not a lawyer.

MIGRATION ACT 1958

Cheers

Nigel

[Guest beersheer]

The Migration Amendment (Visa Capping) Bill 2010 is still showing on the APH website and there is no mention that it has been stopped, but its status says.."Before Reps".

 

ParlInfo - Title Details

 

WTH!

[Guest proud2beaussie]

The Migration Amendment (Visa Capping) Bill 2010 is still showing on the APH website and there is no mention that it has been stopped, but its status says.."Before Reps".

 

ParlInfo - Title Details

 

WTH!

Thst's because that was the status of the bill prior to the election announcement ,the senate legal and constitutional committee has advised that the bill has been discontinued and that is what they have apparently been telling people who made submissions on the bill.

[Guest proud2beaussie]

BTW anyone who doubts that the cap and kill bill would have far reaching effects need only read this paragraph in some background briefing notes I found on the Australian Parliament website.

These notes are prepared by the parliamentary library for members who may wish to speak about the bill.

I found these few lines very interesting:

The immediate policy imperative of this Bill is to limit the number of GSM visas to be granted to applicants whose occupations are no longer needed or are in oversupply in Australia and to enable the substantial backlog of such applications to be removed. However, this Bill has the potential to do far more. It proposes bold amendments that will equip the Government with a potentially far reaching power to unilaterally and retrospectively change the composition of all aspects of the migration program "as the need arises'"

Anyone interested in reading about 18 pages of background to the bill should take a look at.

ParlInfo - Title Details

 

Cheers

Nigel

[Jeffster]

Hi All,

 

Just to let you know letter to Ombudsman is underway and I have a page or so drafted but need some help with research - really need costs and refund policies for US, NZ and any other country that would embarass Australia - believe me it is already VERY embarassing for them; about 10 times the cost and ten times the wait.

[User Name]

Hi All,

 

Just to let you know letter to Ombudsman is underway and I have a page or so drafted but need some help with research - really need costs and refund policies for US, NZ and any other country that would embarass Australia - believe me it is already VERY embarassing for them; about 10 times the cost and ten times the wait.

 

Hi,

 

Here is the fee guide for New Zealand immigration. http://www.immigration.govt.nz/NR/rdonlyres/00B58004-04AB-46C6-B32B-5CE91FBA979A/0/1028.pdf

 

I skip read it, and it costs like under between 1200-1800 NZD to apply.

[Guest Gollywobbler]

BTW anyone who doubts that the cap and kill bill would have far reaching effects need only read this paragraph in some background briefing notes I found on the Australian Parliament website.

These notes are prepared by the parliamentary library for members who may wish to speak about the bill.

I found these few lines very interesting:

 

Anyone interested in reading about 18 pages of background to the bill should take a look at.

ParlInfo - Title Details

 

Cheers

Nigel

 

Hi Nigel

 

Thanks very much for the link and the informatiom provided in the ParlInfo document.

 

Was this document only produced very recently? I note that it contains a reference to something that the Minister said on 9th July 2010, which suggests to me that the discussion document has only been released in the last couple of weeks?

 

I admire the authors of the document immensely. I think they have made a number of things clear to a busy MP, including:

1. They admit to the fact that Australia has had a deliberate policy of linking studying in Australia with skilled independent migration to Australia later on;

2. They admit that such 'research' as exists only goes back to 2005 and (though the authors do not say so) any such research programme would have been tipped onto its head by the sudden banking crisis in September 2008 and the chaos that it has caused in its wake. If I were an MP, I'd be questioning whether Australia's entire skilled migration programme should be allowed to depend on such a tiny amount of interrupted 'research;'

3. They make it clear that if the principles described in the Bill are accepted, every applicant for every single visa will be buying nothing more than a Lottery ticket in the future;

4. They stress that this will cause immense concern to the existing and wider community in the future. The authors seem to me to have refuted the Government's cosy assertion that buying a lottery ticket somehow creates 'certainty;'

5. The authors make it clear that whilst many people have objected to the principles in many different ways, nobody has said that the Government would be doing the right thing if it turned the business of applying for a visa for Oz into a game of Lotto. If I were an MP, I'd be questioning this fact as well;

6. The authors admit that the present Government and the last Howard Goverment both waited until the present Government has ended up with a substantial backlog of skilled independent visa applications. The Government intends to scrap the backlog by scrapping the majority of those applications;

7. They admit that the Inquiry Committee had already asked the Minister to clarify why the Bill could not be specific about which applications he intends to scrap and why he intends to scrap them;

 

I think it is an excellent report which would form the basis for a very good debate into all the aspects - and the ramifications of - the principles that the Gillard Government purports to espouse.

 

If I were a prospective emigrant to another country, whether because of my existing skills or because I wanted to study for something, I would immediately cross Australia off the list of countries that I would be considering. I'd simply ignore Australia and focus on Canada, NZ, USA and the UK instead. There would be zero uncertainty for me - and no purchase of a lottery ticket either (important to me because I hate all types of gambling games.) I think that Australia will soon learn that it doesn't have an immigration problem because it will not have any visa applicants. What the Aussie Government does about the Aussie economy is their problem, not mine.

 

It seems to me that DIAC and the Minister have both obfuscated like mad about what the Minister's real intentions are, but this discussion document makes it very clear what those intentions really are.

 

Very well done for finding the Paper, hun.

 

Cheers

 

Gill

[Guest proud2beaussie]

Hi Gill,

From what I can see it was added to the website on July 19,which was last Monday,after the election had been called,but I would expect that it was written a few weeks ago,probably around the time the

inquiry was receiving submissions,there was probably an expectation that the bill would need to be

debated in committee so the social policy section would have been asked to give some background material for that could be used by anyone who wanted to gain some insight into the reason for the

introduction of the bill.

I found it very interesting.

Cheers

Nigel

[Guest rajinmelb]

Opposition to Slash Migration Numbers if Elected

See story below. I would expect Gillard to shadow Abbott's moves on immigration and given its status as an entree to MasterChef tonight I expect they'll be striving for effect if they get onto that topic in the leaders debate. A lot of things said during election campaigns are later forgotten, but if they both put numbers on the extent of the reduction that might make it very difficult to unsay. The very sad part about this kind of xenophobic auction is that Australia's prosperity - and survival of the GFC - is tied to maintaining sensible levels of net immigration. Going down the path suggested will make Australia more like New Zealand and Ireland. However if this story is just kite flying - testing the effect of a policy before announcing it - then I think every participant on this and every other forum should be letting Tony Abbott know what they think about it.

 

LEADER OF THE OPPOSITION

 

Parliament House

RG109

Canberra ACT 2600

Phone: (02) 6277 4022

Fax: (02) 6277 8562

FEDERAL MEMBER FOR WARRINGAH

 

Level 2

17 Sydney Rd

MANLY NSW 2095

Phone: (02) 9977 6411

Fax: (02) 9977 8715

 

Email:tony.abbott.mp@aph.gov.au

 

 

Coalition to cut migrant numbers

 

STEPHANIE PEATLING

 

July 25, 2010

 

The Coalition is preparing to announce dramatic cuts to the migration program as it seeks to outmanoeuvre the government on population and immigration.

Opposition Leader Tony Abbott is due to make a major announcement on immigration as early as today and is believed to be considering cuts of more than 110,000 places a year - most from the skilled migration program.

''There will be a substantial reduction and that figure has been mentioned several times,'' a senior campaign strategist told The Sun-Herald.

Another insider said the timing of the announcement was still being worked on but it was possible Mr Abbott would nominate the figure as soon as tonight in the debate with Prime Minister Julia Gillard.

Naming the figure would play to voters' concerns that Labor is not prepared to back its statements on population with action, another strategist said.

''Julia Gillard is dog whistling, making tough noises, but won't name any figures. What we're picking up is: it's tough noises but there's no action to back it up. There's not even a substantial review,'' a senior Liberal Party player said.

Liberal strategists believe a commitment to cut immigration would be controversial but help the Coalition's election chances.

''We're certainly picking up that Labor is absolutely vulnerable on this,'' one strategist said.

But it would anger business, which says it needs immigration in order to keep up productivity.

Polling for both parties shows people in crucial outer metropolitan seats are particularly worried about population and immigration, and see the issues as linked.

Sustainable Population Minister Tony Burke said yesterday people needed to concentrate on the distribution of Australia's population.

''One of the problems years ago when it was first tried was decentralisation meant going to areas where there weren't jobs,'' Mr Burke said.

''That has now changed. The mining boom means that in the regions there are jobs, and broadband being rolled out around the country takes away the tyranny of distance for a whole lot of other industries as well.''

Opposition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison would not comment on a specific reduction in numbers but said the size of the immigration program had to be addressed.

''There's only one lever left to pull. That's [immigration] the only thing that will make a difference,'' Mr Morrison said.

Mr Abbott spent yesterday in Perth and Kalgoorlie, where he continued to highlight concerns about asylum seekers and the mining tax.

Despite Labor's strong showing in the opinion polls, party officials are concerned about its support in Queensland and Western Australia.

Mr Abbott announced $50 million for communities to install security cameras to prevent crime.

[Guest TheStig]

Abbot is no less a scum than Evans. Either cancel my application of give me my VISA. Make up your bloody minds for goodness sake

[Guest beersheer]

If the bill is reintroduced, I think it would apply to future applications.Slashing number of immigrants and ceasing applications already in the backlog are 2 different things, but again govt cant win election using the ceasing slogans(Its just a small part of the big problem), so they have to address the big picture.

 

Its totally sucks that they are using us as a bait to win election.

 

I hope (as Gill said) they realize their mistake and take resposibility of their bungles and act accordingly, but not by some "kwik fix" way ...cap n screw:Randy-git:

[Guest]

Guys one thing is clear that Evans would be the next immigration minister and there would be no opposition to this C& C bill in the parliament as both the parties are against the large immigration .So keep the fingers crossed....

[Guest beersheer]

Guys one thing is clear that Evans would be the next immigration minister and there would be no opposition to this C& C bill in the parliament as both the parties are against the large immigration .So keep the fingers crossed....

 

The point/question is would the C & C Bill be reintroduced into the parliament or not........???????:confused:

[Guest proud2beaussie]

The point/question is would the C & C Bill be reintroduced into the parliament or not........???????:confused:

That will depend on who wins the election I would think,if Labor is returned I would think that there would be a fair chance that it would be reintroduced,if not there is also quite a good chance that the coalition would introduce their own version of it,given that their policy is to dramatically cut the size of the migration program.

[Guest Mongobear]

Hi All,

 

Just to let you know letter to Ombudsman is underway and I have a page or so drafted but need some help with research - really need costs and refund policies for US, NZ and any other country that would embarass Australia - believe me it is already VERY embarassing for them; about 10 times the cost and ten times the wait.

 

Hi Jeffster,

 

which countries are still missing? I could try to find out some details.

 

Cheers

Uli