Australia is facing a shortage of teachers in the medium to long term because of both the retirement of existing teachers and a general demand for teachers in specific locations and subject matter areas.

The South Australia government has released new details on the state's Designated Area Migration Agreement (DAMA), including the list of eligible of occupations. 

The permanent, employer-sponsored Regional Sponsored Migration Scheme (RSMS) subclass 187 visa has generated lots of attention recently for a few reasons.

The Australian government recently announced that reciprocal Work and Holiday arrangements between Australia and Greece will commence from 1 July 2019. Up to 500 places annually will be available in each country for young Australians and Greeks aged 18 to 30.

There are several reasons why your Australian visa can be cancelled. The following scenarios are common:

• Cancelled due to breaching a visa condition.
• Cancelled on reasonable suspicion that conditions of the visa are being breached.
• Cancelled due to pending criminal charges.
• Cancelled due to providing false and misleading information.
• Cancelled due to failure of the character test.
• Student visa holders not meeting the requirements of their course or not being enrolled full time.

In positive news for international students in regional Australia, which includes Adelaide, the Department of Home Affairs will be introducing an extra year extra year of post-study work rights. The extension will be available to the cohort of graduates from 2021 that hold a Temporary Graduate subclass 485 visa.

From 16 November 2019 the Department of Home Affairs will introduce two new skilled regional provisional visas with a new permanent visa pathway from November 2022. The two new provisional visas will supersede two existing visas and will include some significant changes that prospective applicants need to be aware of.

From 16 November 2019 the Department of Home Affairs will introduce two new skilled regional provisional visas with a new permanent visa pathway from November 2022. The two new provisional visas will supersede two existing visas and will include some significant changes that prospective applicants need to be aware of.

Since this post was published the Department of Home Affairs has advised that these new sponsorship requirements will not be commencing from 17 April 2019 as was previously communicated. At this stage there is no timeframe for the introduction of these sponsorship changes.

In November 2018 we posted about new legislation that would significantly impact the process for lodging family visas. The new requirement that sponsors for family visas be approved before a visa application can be lodged will take effect on a yet to be dermined date. It will apply to all Prospective Marriage Visa,  Partner Visa or Parent Visa applications lodged from this date.

The Morrison Government has released a plan to reduce congestion in major cities, encourage more skilled migrants to enter and reside in regional areas. On 20 March 2019, Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced that for the next four years immigration will be capped 160,000 migrants per year. While the total amount of immigration will be capped, the number of skilled migrants entering Australia will be raised using regional visas and skilled visa streams.