Labor inherited a migration system burdened by asylum backlogs, temporary visa pressures and administrative failure. Four years later, the clean-up remains far from complete.
The Albanese government inherited a migration mess from Peter Dutton but has been very slow cleaning it up.
The Department of Home Affairs also failed to anticipate the blow out in temporary residents.
As Abul Rizvi has asked in P&I: how does the government propose to deliver a net migration target of 225,000 when current net migration is running at around 300,000 and we have almost 3 million temporary entrants in Australia? Together, they are putting unsustainable pressure on permanent migration.
The system is clogged.
A major factor contributing to the continuing migration mess has been the burying of a diminished migration function within a larger, malfunctioning Department of Home Affairs with its focus on security. The problem has been made worse with senior and experienced migration staff leaving the new department at the time of its creation.
The problems with Home Affairs are also reflected in its handling of the multicultural function. The Minister for Multicultural Affairs, Anne Aly, is overshadowed by the senior minister, Tony Burke, even though she is also in the cabinet. The government gives lip service to multiculturalism but gives it little real attention.
The inherited migration mess comes courtesy of Peter Dutton. He was minister responsible for immigration and home affairs from 2014 to 2021.
The Howard, Abbott and Morrison governments had an election-winning formula of ‘stopping the boats’, although Tony Abbott at one point kept the door open for tens of thousands of boat arrivals.
In May 2011, the Australian and Malaysian governments announced an arrangement that newly arrived boat arrivals (initially up to 800) would be transferred from Australia to Malaysia, with their asylum claims to be heard by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). In return, Australia would accept 4,000 other refugees from Malaysia that had been processed by UNHCR. The arrangement with Malaysia was signed on 25 July 2011. This arrangement would likely have stopped boat arrivals at the time because it removed any chance of their staying in Australia. But the Coalition, along with the Greens and some independents, opposed the necessary legislation in September 2011 to give effect to the arrangement with Malaysia. The refugee lobby in Australia also publicly opposed the Malaysian Arrangement. This resulted in a surge of boat arrivals over the next two years.
In July 2013, the Rudd government effectively stopped the boats. It was harsh but effective. Once again asylum seekers would be sent to offshore processing centres. Any persons arriving by boat after 19 July of that year would not be resettled in Australia.
By the time the much-vaunted Operation Sovereign Borders came into effect in September 2013, at the time of election of the new Abbott government, the number of boat arrivals had been reduced to a trickle.
Having allowed the acceleration of boat arrivals by blocking the implementation of the Malaysia Arrangement, the Coalition later claimed that it had stopped the boats. It was good politics but quite dishonest.
As one minister was quoted as saying, “the more boats that come the better”.
Our national policies on asylum seekers have been built on the shifting sands of deception. Boats were stopped, but then asylum seekers came by air in large numbers with many still residing in the community for up to five years while their status is determined.
The legacy media swallowed the ‘stop the boats’ slogan. It peddled the lie that a succession of Coalition governments had stopped the boats. Then it failed to notice the large number of asylum seekers coming by air.
Believing his own propaganda, Peter Dutton took his eye off the game. With boats effectively stopped, ‘asylum seekers’ started coming almost immediately by air. Peter Dutton ignored the problem, or perhaps his department didn’t think it mattered as they came on valid visas.
Migration scams from southern China and Malaysia were obvious but Peter Dutton didn’t seem to know or care. Perhaps he was too engrossed with African gangs in Melbourne.
Between 7 September 2013 and 21 May 2022, 143,749 people arrived by plane and made applications for permanent protection visas. In peak periods air arrivals lodging such visas surged to roughly 2,000 people per month. Peter Dutton was the responsible minister in this period, 2014-2021.
In 2014-15, estimated onshore protection claims (air arrivals) were 8,500 persons. The number increased to 27,900 in 2017-18. There was a reduction because of COVID but by 2024-25, about 24,000 estimated air arrivals made onshore protection claims.
Of these arrivals, 50–60 per cent came on visitor visas and about 15–20 per cent on student visas. The remainder came on various other temporary visas. Most of these air arrivals came from China, Malaysia, India, Pakistan and Vietnam. They had very low rates of acceptance as refugees.
Previously asylum seekers coming by boat came from countries of war and repression such as Afghanistan, Iran, Iraq and Sri Lanka. These asylum seekers had high rates of acceptance as refugees.
As a result of this large increase in air arrivals under Peter Dutton’s watch, there were major delays in processing the arrivals who were seeking refugee status. Delays in the Department of Home Affairs are estimated to have been between five months to five years depending on the complexity of the case. Those refused refugee status then often appealed to the Administrative Review Tribunal (ART), where appeals took 3.5 to 5 years. The resulting waiting time of people, in the pipeline waiting for determination, could be five to seven years. They remained on bridging visas.
People on bridging visas are mainly allowed to work. Similarly, most people on bridging visas can access Medicare while awaiting a decision on their future.
The Albanese government knew it had a problem. The Nixon Review, which it commissioned, was released in October 2023. The review uncovered abuses within Australia’s immigration framework, including organised crime, human trafficking, and migrant worker exploitation. But problems continued.
The Albanese government now says that it plans to get net migration down to 225,000. Abul Rizvi reminds us that it will be very hard to do that when we have a stock of almost three million temporary entrants in Australia putting unsustainable pressure on permanent migration.
That three million includes 130,000 people in the asylum seeker system which is still growing by over 1,000 per month. Over 110,000 of the 130,000 have been refused at the primary stage and have not departed.
In addition to those in the asylum seeker pipeline there are over 270,000 people on temporary student graduate visas. This is, in part, the result of government underfunding universities which then embarked on large-scale recruitment of overseas students to bolster their budgets.
There are another 260,000 people on skilled temporary visas most of whom will also be looking for permanent residence. At the same time almost half of skilled migrants in Australia are working below their qualification level. Our complex recognition system leaves urgently needed teachers, nurses, engineers and tradespeople underused.
Another 225,000 are on working holiday-maker visas. International working holiday arrangements used to be cultural exchange programs. They now look more like cheap labour programs with widespread exploitation.
The government clearly has a major job ahead of it to make that 225,000 net migration target.
But it has been very slow to act at both the administrative and political level, even though funds have been increased to get the caseload under some control. That included money for the department, the Administrative Review Tribunal and the Federal Court. Resources have also been put into strengthening the compliance function. But so far, the backlog has increased rather than reduced.
The government inherited a migration mess. It has been too slow cleaning it up. That has given space for the Coalition and One Nation to dog whistle about race and religion. Think Pauline Hanson’s question: are there any good Muslims?
This leads the community to wonder: can the government fix a serious problem without Trump-like deportations, particularly as it holds many electorates with strong migrant communities?
John Menadue is the Founder of Pearls and Irritations and a board member. He was formerly the Editor-in-Chief. John was the Secretary of the Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet under Gough Whitlam and Malcolm Fraser, Ambassador to Japan, Secretary of the Department of Immigration and CEO of Qantas.