Australian Immigration Update

On 18 November 2017, changes to Australia’s Immigration Regulations regarding Health Debt and Health Insurance arrangements became effective:

For some time, it has been a requirement for most applicants applying for temporary residence in Australia to provide evidence that they have acceptable private health insurance in place in Australia prior to their application being approved.

With effect from 18 November 2017, a new condition 8602 will be introduced which will provide that “The holder must not have an outstanding public health debt”. This means that health authorities in Australia will be able to report unpaid debts for health care costs to the Department of Immigration. It is our understanding that initial action that will be taken by the Department will be to encourage the visa holder to contact the health care provider and to make arrangements for payment of the debt. However, a failure to pay the debt will constitute a breach of the condition, and may render the visa holder subject to discretionary visa cancellation.

Grandfathering provisions for certain current 457 visa holders

Since the changes to Australia’s 457 visa category were announced in April 2017, there has been an anxious wait by existing 457 visa holders who previously would have been eligible to apply for permanent residence under the Employer Nomination category or Regional Skilled Migration category.

The Department of Immigration has now announced that 457 visa holders will be able to access certain existing provisions under the current Transitional stream provided:

• occupation requirements remain the same (i.e. there are no restrictions provided the nominee continues to work in the same position for the same employer as approved for their subclass 457 visa);
• the age requirement will remain at less than 50 years of age; and
• the work experience requirement will remain as two out of the three years on a subclass 457, prior to nomination will remain at two years.

Proposed Temporary Sponsored Parent visa

The Australian Government previously announced that it would be introducing a Temporary Sponsored Parent visa category in November 2017.

The relevant legislation to introduce this new visa category was part of the Migration Amendment (Family Violence and Other Measures) Bill 2016. This Bill was not passed in the Senate and as such the introduction of the proposed Temporary Sponsored Parent visa category will not proceed at this time.

There are still a number of visa options available to parents who wish to live in Australia on a temporary or permanent basis with their children. These visa options include:

• Contributory parent visa
• Contributory parent (temporary) visa
• Investor Retirement (temporary) visa
• Significant Investor visa stream of the Business Innovation and Investment (Provisional) visa (subclass 188)

Australian Citizenship

As advised in the October 2017 IMC Migration Immigration update, the proposed changes to Australian Citizenship Legislation was not passed by the Australian Government. As a result, the previous Regulations remain in place including the residence requirements and English language criteria.

This reprieve may be short-lived as the Minister of Immigration has stated his intentioned to reintroduce this Legislation with some minor changes in the new year with the intention that the changes will come into effect on 1 July 2017. For this reason we suggest that any permanent resident of Australia who meets the current criteria and is considering Australian Citizenship should apply without delay.

For further information or advise on any of the matters dealt with in this Citizenship update or any matter regarding Australian permanent or temporary residence contact Ivan Chait (MARN: 9253612 by email ivan@imcmigration.com or telephone + 61418404604.