Analysis shows recent inflows of onshore international students are unsustainable and threaten to derail the Albanese Government's education strategy, writes Dr Abul Rizvi.
THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT'S Draft International Education and Skills Strategic Framework says:
“the Government is committed to implementing a managed system to deliver sustainable growth over time for onshore international education”.
But nowhere in this strategy is "sustainable growth" defined in any measurable terms.
While Education Minister, Jason Clare and Prime Minister, Anthony Albanese have both indicated their desire to get net migration back down to pre-pandemic levels — they have not indicated what this means for the international education contribution to net migration.
Are we to understand that "sustainable growth" is to be defined by the level of the student caps in 2025?
If that is the case, then there is a large disconnect between the level of the student caps and the student contribution to net migration in Treasury’s net migration forecasts.
The Department of Home Affairs (DHA) are yet to indicate what the student caps mean for the processing of student visas.
Will DHA simply approve visa applications for each provider until the caps are hit?
That would seem highly unlikely as the student caps are not reflected anywhere in the Migration Act or Regulations. It is quite possible that, for many providers, their caps may simply not be reached because they cannot generate sufficient applications that meet student visa criteria.
When a senior DHA official was asked how the Department would define sustainable growth of the overseas student industry by the Senate Committee examining the current ESOS Bill that introduces student capping, she stated:
“growth in the sector where there are sufficient resources available in the Department of Home Affairs to process visas with rigour to ensure that only people who meet the criteria are granted visas”.
Surely, the Government does not define "sustainable growth" based on the level of visa processing resources allocated to DHA?
That would be utter nonsense unless the senior officer was just making a play for more resources. The same senior official also said:
“the Department was not working towards a target to reduce net migration”.
If DHA is not working towards reducing net migration to pre-pandemic levels, then it hasn’t been listening very closely to the public statements of the Prime Minister on this topic.
Perhaps that explains why the Government keeps missing its net migration forecasts.
How might sustainable growth be defined?
In measurable terms, sustainable growth of overseas students must consider both the flow of students over time as well as the size of the stock.
In terms of flow, it must be the case that over time:
- student arrivals (both onshore and offshore); minus
- students and temporary graduates who secure permanent residence; minus
- student and temporary graduate departures; equal
- zero.
If that is not the case, then we must accept that a portion of students, possibly a large and growing portion, will be stuck in immigration limbo.
Some of those in immigration limbo would be seeking means of lawfully extending their stay while others may be unlawfully in Australia without a visa.
The above equation was well above zero every year in the decade prior to the pandemic.
While it was below zero for a brief period during the pandemic, we cannot expect pandemic circumstances to prevail regularly.
Post-pandemic, student inflows have grown at record rates while departures have been very sluggish, partly due to a very strong labour market.
Even with the student caps as proposed, the above equation will not be anywhere near zero in the future. That means the number of students in immigration limbo will keep growing until they hit a visa brick wall.
When that happens, we will see a rising number of students whose visas have been refused appealing to the Administrative Review Tribunal (ART) – formerly known as the Administrative Appeals Tribunal (AAT) – or applying for asylum.
That is exactly what is happening now but will get a lot worse over the next 6-12 months.
In other words, the recent inflow of students is unsustainable.
The stock of students and former students who have not secured permanent residence in Australia is currently around 1.1 million.
That number includes:
- 675,000 on student visas;
- 110,000 on bridging visas awaiting a decision on an onshore student visa application (that is likely to include around 17,000 at the ART);
- 228,000 on temporary graduate visas;
- another 5,000 who may have applied for a temporary graduate visa but are on bridging visas awaiting a decision;
- around 25,000 (out of 118,000 asylum seekers currently in Australia) who have applied for asylum;
- around 50,000 on a temporary skilled visa; and
- around 20,000 still on a covid visa.
The question is not just whether the Government considers 1.1 million students and former students a sustainable level but also the fact the number of former students in the bridging visa backlog; on temporary graduate visas; at the ART; or having applied for asylum will continue to grow.
What the Government will want to avoid is getting into the situation Canada now finds itself in – trying to get almost 1 million students and temporary workers to leave because it has a rapidly weakening labour market.
But does it have a plan to avoid that?
Dr Abul Rizvi is an Independent Australia columnist and a former Deputy Secretary of the Department of Immigration. You can follow Abul on Twitter @RizviAbul.
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