Paul Scarr (Queensland, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Immigration) Share this | Hansard source

There is some, or even a lot, that I support in the contribution that was being made by my friend and colleague Senator Shoebridge. I think that he has made a positive contribution and raised a number of material issues in relation to this debate on the Administrative Review Tribunal and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2025.

However, there is a key point that we teased out from the Department of Home Affairs during the last Senate estimates, and I do want to talk about this. One of the attributes of our administrative law review system is the ability of applicants seeking review to introduce new evidence. The Department of Home Affairs were quite clear that one of the issues they are facing in relation to documents which haven't been presented at the initial application stage for a student visa is that it isn't necessarily that the documents exist and they haven't been attached. It could well be—and this is the issue the Department of Home Affairs raised—that they haven't got their enrolment, because they haven't satisfied the particular requirements of the visa. They've lodged the application without meeting those requirements, so they get refused, but then they can go into the ART system and they have that period, which is now, on average, over a year—one year and three months—to get the document. If they have the document then, it goes back to the Department of Home Affairs.

We have a system where, if someone applying for a student visa doesn't have their proverbial ducks in a row, with all the documents they need to have, and the Department of Home Affairs rejects the visa, the applicant can go to the ART, knowing the ART has to consider all new evidence, which could include the meeting of the omissions which prevented them from getting the student visa in the first instance. This is a fundamental issue in relation to how the system works. You can put in an application without all the relevant information, because you don't have it—you don't meet the requirements. When you get knocked back, you know you can appeal to the ART, and you've got an extra year and a half, or whatever it is, to get the omissions filled. You'll either get the visa or it will go back to the Department of Home Affairs. The system can't work that. It's breaking.

The numbers are extraordinary. I try to avoid hyperbole, but in this case there's not enough hyperbole. Consider this: 2½ years ago in the Administrative Review Tribunal, as Senator Shoebridge touched on, there were 2,278 cases where people were seeking a review of decisions on cancellations or refusals of student visas. That's 2,278—just hold that figure. Only 2½ years later, as at 30 November—and I checked the latest figures—there are 48,826 cases. It's extraordinary. It's gone from 2,278 cases 2½ years ago to now 48,826 cases that have to be resolved in the ART. These are effectively court cases that have to be resolved by the system.

In our last Senate estimates—and Senator Shoebridge was there—we were asking questions of the always helpful registrar of the ART. He told us that, as at 31 October 2025, there were 46,590 cases. I checked the figures yesterday, and in just one month that had increased by 2,236 cases. In just one month they'd got an additional case load equal to the amount they had in total 2½ years ago. In just one month it's gone up 2½ thousand. I don't know what it's going to be when we go into estimates next week, Senator Shoebridge, but it won't surprise me if the number is over 50,000, given this rate of increase. It's quite ordinary.