Australia

‘I can never feel settled’: wait time for key Australian work visa more than doubles

Processing times for an important skilled worker visa have more than doubled and the number of migrants languishing on bridging visas has increased six-fold, a new report warns.

The Migrant Workers Centre on Friday released a report documenting the deterioration in Australia’s visa processing system, which found processing times for the 887 skilled regional visa has more than doubled since 2018.

It is now taking at least 24 months for the government to process an application for an 887 visa, which rewards people who have lived and worked in specified areas of regional Australia, providing a pathway to permanent residency.

That’s up from a processing time of 10 months in mid-2018, the report said.

The report found the number of migrants on bridging visas has increased from 60,795 in 2014 to 333,357 in 2022, the report found. It also warned that the processing delays are leaving migrants without working rights and at “greater risk of labour exploitation” and wage theft.

“Living on a visa with an impending expiry makes anyone insecure,” the MWC report warns.

“Australia gains nothing from not allowing people to get settled and making them vulnerable to exploitative work conditions.”

Migrants who have applied for the 887 visa are preparing to protest across the country on Friday, angry at the worsening delays.

Among them will be Melbourne-based engineer Brijesh Batra, who has been waiting for his 887 visa for almost 14 months.

He says he was sacked from his job in 2020 because, without permanent residency, he was not eligible for jobkeeper.

Batra said he got no support from the government throughout Covid, because of his visa status.

“For three or four months I had no income, no support from the government,” he said. “That was one of the worst periods of my life.”

Even now, the lack of permanent residency denies him work opportunities and adds significantly to the cost of buying a home. It has left him questioning whether he wants to remain in Australia.

“I am 43, I still don’t have a house of my own, I can never feel like I’m settled in any country, because the roots are not strong,” he told the Guardian.

He has heard “nothing back at all” from the department about his application, but its website says processing times for the 887 visas are now at 24 months. Three-quarters of all applications are taking more than two years to decide.