A stream of foreign students embarking on “easy to obtain” courses overwhelmed the nation’s immigration program in 2009, according to a senior federal government official.
The comments made by Immigration Department assistant first secretary Mr Kruno Kukoc are the most significant admission yet from government, of how some of Australia’s recent skilled migration policies had failed by 2009 to meet their primary objective; to ensure skill’s shortages in Australia could be met.
In his speech Mr Kukoc said foreign students had instead been provided an easy path to permanent residence.
“These policy settings led to a situation where many international students were coming to Australia … with a view only of achieving an immigration outcome,” said the assistant first secretary.
“Eventually the number of international students in Australia with expectations of a permanent residence outcome completely overwhelmed the capacity of our capped annual permanent migration program.”
Mr Kokoc was referring to the period when Australia was inundated with students from countries such as India and Nepal who enrolled on inexpensive cookery and hairdressing courses. Subsequently, immigration by early 2009 was peaking at over 305,000.
“This growth was sudden and unusual …driven by incentives provided within our migration settings rather than the benefits of study in Australia,” said Mr Kokoc, who added that the surge in student visas was the result of generous concessionary points afforded for onshore study under the points test, and the expansion of the Skilled Occupation List to include ‘easy to obtain’ courses that provided a pathway to permanent residence.
“These policy settings led to a situation where many international students were coming to Australia, and basing their course of study, with a view only of achieving an immigration outcome,” said the senior Immigration Department spokesman.
Mr Kukoc said that reforms to the General Skilled Migration (GSM) program since 2009 have focused on restoring the integrity of the program by “breaking the automatic nexus between study and permanent residence. With noneducational pull factors removed, the number of non-genuine students fell.
“None of this detracts from the fact that under our new student visa and skilled migration arrangements there may be a possible (and wholly positive) immigration outcome following genuine study. But such an outcome is certainly not guaranteed and will be driven by genuine labour.”
Mr Kukoc reiterated the need for migration policies that complement, rather than compete with Australians and the skills Australia already possesses.
“We need to be conscious of current needs and future trends. Our programs, both temporary and permanent, must remain flexible in order to do this…. the more we let the market select our migrants, while maintaining integrity, the more we can provide Australia with the best migration program possible.”
Migration analyst Dr Bob Birrell told Neos Kosmos that whilst the government’s changes to the migration program had successfully plugged the hole in the system, concerns remained following the lobbying of government by Australian education institutions keen to maximise foreign student numbers.
“There’s been a pushback by the education industry who have lobbied for concessions because of the decline in enrolments from overseas,” said Dr Birrell, “the GSM program now allows all students who graduate with degree level qualifications to stay on for two years after they finish their course and this adds to the number of casuals coming into the entry-level labour market.
“There are already too many people trying to get casual jobs, and this will make it even harder for locals to get into those labour markets.
The Monash professor said the further deregulation of student selection processes was also a concern. “Universities will be the main decision-makers as to whether a student is bonfide and has enough money to stay here. That’s wide open to exploitation for institutions that are desperate for overseas enrolment.”