Australia’s Ministerial Direction 111 Replaces 107; Implements International Student Cap

The Australian government acknowledged that MD 107 unevenly affected the education providers of the country and hence it was replaced by MD 111 which creates a more even approach to student visa processing across various types of education providers.

Study in Australia: The Australian government has replaced Ministerial Direction 107 with Ministerial Direction 111. This move is welcomed by the education providers however they still oppose the caps implemented on international student enrolments.

Senator Mehreen Faruqi, Deputy Leader of the Australian Greens and spokesperson for Higher Education commented, "Finally, the worst of MD107 which was throttling the tertiary education sector, is gone but Labor is using the same flawed international student caps that were thoroughly rejected by the Senate and the sector for their new MD111. This shows that the heart of the issue remains unchanged. This might be a small reprieve for a sector that has been crushed for too long, but implementing international student caps by stealth through a ministerial direction is sneaky and does not tackle the issues universities face."

“Labor continues to dog whistle and blame international students and migrants for the housing crisis they did not cause. The Albanese government should be ashamed of competing with Dutton’s Coalition in the terrible race to see who wins on punching down on migrants the hardest,” added Senator Mehreen Faruqi.

MD 111 To Slow Foreign Student Visa Process

After the failure of the implementation of the international student cap in Australia, MD111 to operate from today. Instead of capping student numbers, it introduces two categories for student visa processing - "high priority" and "standard priority".

Minister for Home Affairs, Tony Burke, said, “The best option would have been the cap that was voted down by Peter Dutton, but this option will still allow us to use one of the biggest levers in our migration system," added the Guardian.

Abul Rizvi, a former deputy secretary of immigration, said, “MD111 certainly isn’t a cap on student visas and it would be illegal for the government to try to use it that way."

“The order of processing doesn’t make much difference if there is no backlog. The primary factor is the refusal rate which is linked to the risk rating system and hits regional universities much harder. There’s no proposal to change it, it just means a faster no. This looks like political point scoring to me – they’re trying to show Dutton ‘we’ve got to do what we were going to do’,” Rizvi added.

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