Ministerial Direction 111 sets speed limits for student visa processing
/With legislation to place hard caps on international students being thwarted in parliament, the government has announced they will instead limit student visa processing by replacing Ministerial Direction 107, which only came into effect just over a year ago, with new Ministerial Direction 111 today.
Surging international student arrivals have taken the brunt of the blame for the increase in Australia’s Net Overseas Migration (NOM) and the effects it has on the cost of living. Whether this is warranted is open to debate.
There are many ways of regulating the processing of applications within Australia’s current migration laws. Some such as cap and ceasing applications, which is what happened to the subclass 476 – Skilled – Recognised Graduate visas, are more drastic than others.
One way of limiting arrivals without destroying the overseas education industry entirely is by regulating the processing of student visa applications. This can be done using a Ministerial Direction. Ministerial Directions are used for various reasons and the most prevalent is by ordering processing priorities based on the characteristics of the application.
The new Direction applies to all offshore subclass 500 – Student visa applications lodged or will be lodged but does not apply to applications where it is readily apparent the application should be refused and applications before the Administrative Review Tribunal. It also will not affect applications where there are integrity concerns.
There are two classes of priorities. The first is Priority 1 – High, which are offshore student visa applications associated with any higher education or vocational education and training sector where the commencement would not exceed the education provider’s prioritisation threshold.
The prioritisation threshold is defined as 80 per cent of the education provider’s indicative allocation of new overseas student commencements. This is measured by their Confirmation of Enrolments and the number of existing student visa holders or bridging visa holders held in association with a student visa application where that visa holder was not enrolled or previously enrolled with the same education provider either in the same or previous calendar year. There are a few exemptions that will not count towards the threshold, including being enrolled in a postgraduate research course or students from certain Pacific Island nations and Timor-Leste.
When this threshold is reached, any further student visa application with this education provider is kicked down to Priority 2 – Standard processing. To complicate things further, there are several exempt categories of student visa applications where, even if the threshold is reached, will still take the higher processing priorities. These include:
School students,
Non-award sector students,
Standalone ELICOS students,
Student enrolled with a TAFE provider
Students enrolled in a Pilot Training Course,
postgraduate research students,
Foreign Affairs students,
Defence students,
Students sponsored by the Commonwealth government,
Certain students with scholarships,
Students from certain Pacific Island nations and Timor-Leste,
Students enrolled in certain transnational education arrangements, and
Subsequent student visa applicants where there is an applicant who is under 18 years old and dependent on either the student or the student’s partner.
As long as the education provider is aware of their threshold, it will disincentivise them from enrolling too many new offshore students in any program year. Delays in processing may see the enrolled student forced to delay when they can commence their studies in Australia.