KEY POINTS
- "Systemic abuses" of Australia's immigration system are occurring, Home Affairs Minister Clare O'Neil says.
- She has pledged the system will be reviewed following reports of visa rorting and foreign worker exploitation.
- Immigration experts say the visa backlog must be reduced, and tougher penalties are needed to stem criminal activity.
Australia's immigration system is in a "state of disrepair" and will be reviewed in a desperate search for answers as to how criminals are exploiting it.
Home Affairs Minister Clare O'Neil flagged the independent review on Monday in the wake of recent reports of visa rorting and foreign worker exploitation, uncovered by a joint investigation between Nine's Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, and 60 Minutes.
That included revelations that a human trafficking boss entered the country despite having been jailed in the United Kingdom.
SBS News has confirmed the review will be conducted separately from the one announced at the Jobs and Skills Summit in September, which came amid concerns over . The review's terms of reference are yet to be revealed.
"It's absolutely clear to me that there are systemic abuses of the system occurring at the moment," Ms O'Neil told ABC radio on Monday.
Ms O'Neil took aim at Opposition leader Peter Dutton over his handling of the issue when the Coalition was in government.
She said he "talked tough" on borders but at the same time presided "over a system that was allowing these things to happen".
Exploitation in the immigration system can go undetected due to inadequate visa processing capacity, according to Mary Crock, a professor of public law at the University of Sydney's Law School.
"If you don't have enough people on the ground to make decisions, you also don't have an appropriate number of people to ensure ... that there are not abuses occurring," she said.
Professor Crock said the also exacerbated exploitation because "abusive cases" could not be rooted out quickly. Instead, applicants may be able to legally remain and work in Australia under a bridging visa while their application for a substantive visa is processed.
Labor, who won power in May, inherited a backlog of . The Albanese government recently revealed it had after engaging an extra 260 staff to process visa applications. The , unveiled in October, showed a $42.2 million commitment over two years from 2022-23 to increase visa processing capacity.
Professor Crock said caseworkers should also be assigned so that one person is able to oversee the entirety of a visa application and ensure applicants are not exploiting the system, or are being exploited.
A review should run for at least a year and should hear from "all parts of society", including businesses, unions, migration agents, and migrants because of the system's complexity, according to Abul Rizvi, a former deputy secretary of the immigration department.
Mr Rizvi said the review should examine how this was allowed to happen, how many perpetrators there are and where they can be identified and located, and how migrants are being exploited.
He also called for tougher penalties, such as jail terms, for employers who underpay migrant workers.
"Unless you can stop the extent to which migrants are screwed, the financial incentive for bad actors to operate in this space will continue," Mr Rizvi said.
Meanwhile, the government has unveiled what the review announced at the Jobs and Skills Summit will cover.
for the review say its goal is to "develop a holistic strategy that articulates the purpose, structure and objectives of Australia's migration system to ensure it meets the national interest in the coming decades".
An interim report will be given to the minister on 28 February, containing priority recommendations for next year's budget.
Former top bureaucrat Martin Parkinson, labour migration legal expert Joanna Howe and former Skilled Migration Ministerial Advisory Council member John Azarias will carry out the review.
SBS News has contacted Mr Dutton's office for comment.
With AAP.
