Latest Immigration Insights

A successful High Court challenge (Plaintiff M27/2025 v Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs [2025] HCA 40) handled by Kindra Migration Lawyers (formerly WLW Migration Lawyers) Zac Bright (Associate) and James Wardlaw (Partner) is a clear reminder that departmental decision-makers must genuinely consider all information an applicant provides, even if it is not in English.

Are you a citizen of the USA looking at migrating to Australia? There are several different visa pathways that you can consider.

The Genuine Temporary Entrant requirement (also referred to as “GTE”) refers to the requirement that a person applying for a temporary visa is considered a visitor or a genuine temporary entrant to Australia.

Demonstrating that a position for which you are nominating a foreign worker is ‘genuine’ can be a particularly tricky requirement to meet.

If you are a business looking to nominate a prospective foreign employee, you will need to meet the Annual Market Salary Rate requirement.

If you are thinking about nominating a foreign employee under the subclass 482 Temporary Skill Shortage visa program, a requirement that you will have to meet as part of the Nomination application is that you have undertaken a step called ‘Labour Market Testing’ (LMT).

The Australian Government has announced a new permanent residency visa, the Pacific Engagement visa (subclass 192) also referred to as ‘PEV’.

Proposed changes to the Student and Temporary Graduate Visas increase the visa criteria, aiming to reduce non-genuine applications.

Significant changes are coming in the next year! As often happens with the ever-changing migration law sector, further changes have been announced which are set to shake up the Australian migration skilled worker program.

As of 11 December 2023 the Federal Government has streamlined Labour Market Testing requirements for businesses looking to sponsor migrant workers, making the process easier for prospective business sponsors.

The Minister for Home Affairs has recently announced an investment of $54 million into ‘’real-time processing’’ of new protection visa applications which will result in faster and more efficient processing of newly lodged applications.

Over the weekend changes to the subclass 186 visa were implemented, providing a new pathway to permanent residency for skilled workers holding 482 visas.