Overview
- Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke set out the package in a National Press Club speech on Thursday that aims to cut net overseas migration toward about 245,000 in 2026/27 and 225,000 thereafter.
- The changes bar most future international students from bringing partners or children, restrict course-to-course student transfers, and rework the points test to prioritise construction, health, agriculture and other trades.
- Working Holiday Maker rules will use a ballot to limit second-year places to 45,000 and third-year places to 5,000, and visitor visas will carry a 'no further stay' condition to stop category switching.
- The government will boost enforcement by hiring 100 compliance officers and seeking roughly 250 extra detention beds while reverting to short voluntary-leave windows for overstayers before detention or deportation.
- Some measures can be implemented by ministerial direction and processing pauses already in place, but tighter asylum‑claim and other reforms need new laws and face uncertain parliamentary negotiation with the Opposition.