1327th OGM and Open Lecture

“Australian Immigration Policy and
the Federal Election”

Dr Abul Rizvi PSM
Former Deputy Secretary
Australian Department of Immigration

Date: Wednesday, 6 November 2024, 6.30 pm AEDT
Venue: Zoom webinar
Entry: No charge
All are welcome

Please click here to join the
Zoom webinar on 6 November at 6.30 pm

Business of the Meeting

The Agenda for the Ordinary General Meeting will be available from the Meetings page of the website.

Summary: Towards the end stages of COVID, there was significant concern students, working holiday makers and others would not return quickly enough. Unprecedented changes were made to accelerate the return of these visa holders against the background of major labour shortages. That pressure continued for the new Labor Government, with the Opposition criticising Labor, for not moving quickly enough to boost immigration to address labour shortages.

But by the end of 2022, it was clear student visa applications were booming. In the first half of 2023, Labor Ministers insisted the Government had no role in managing net migration and that the surge in net migration was just a temporary catch-up after COVID. This was partly true but mainly false.

From mid-2023, the Government introduced a bewildering array of student visa policy changes to reign in net migration to a long-term target of 235,000 from a peak of 550,000 in 2022-23. Despite offshore student applications having fallen significantly, the Government has now introduced student caps. These are being attacked on all fronts.

This is in the context of the Opposition demanding more be done to reduce net migration to 160,000 per annum. Immigration will be a key issue in the next Federal Election. How are we to understand the two competing policies and what will be needed to deliver them?

Abul Rizvi is an economics, accounting and public policy graduate from the ANU and holds a PhD in immigration and population policy from Melbourne University. From 1998, Rizvi managed major growth in overseas students, skilled temporary migration, visitors and working holiday makers, including the development of pathways to permanent migration. Between 1996 and 2006, Rizvi was Chair of the Commonwealth/State Working Party on State-Specific and Regional Migration which gave state/territory governments a much greater role in immigration to their jurisdictions.

He was responsible for commissioning research on the demographic, economic and budgetary impact of immigration that was extensively used in the development of the 2002 and 2007 Intergenerational Reports. He was Deputy Secretary responsible for all aspects of immigration, humanitarian, citizenship and settlement policy from 2005.

Rizvi was awarded the Public Service Medal and the Centenary Medal for services to the development and implementation of Australian immigration policy. Rizvi is a frequent media commentator on population, immigration and its impact on Australia’s economic and budget directions. He was invited to participate in the 2022 Jobs and Skill Summit and recently published a book in the ‘In the National Interest’ series titled ‘Population Shock’. Rizvi recently presented on immigration policy in a televised address to the National Press Club.

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