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

Exactly, Senator Lambie, and the waiting time can be deadly. Two and a half years ago the student visa appeals constituted three per cent of the case load of the ART; it's now 38.4 per cent. It was three per cent and it's now 38.4 per cent. That means that you might be waiting for an NDIS decision, a Veterans' Affairs decision, a social security decision, a tax decision, another migration decision—say, for a skills in demand visa—but the ART is absolutely overwhelmed with these student visa applications. It's extraordinary.

Then there are the wait times. The latest figure I've got in terms of wait times for these matters to be resolved shows it's now out to 66 weeks for these student visa applications. At the rate of lodgement, it's just going to blow out further. That's one year and three months.