Coalition doubles down on promise of student caps, but still doesn’t say how

The Coalition has doubled down on its promise to impose “tougher caps” on foreign students at city universities but dismissed Labor’s latest attempt to limit overseas numbers, continuing a political tussle over how it will achieve deeper cuts to migration.

Opposition frontbenchers Sarah Henderson and Dan Tehan delivered their strongest message yet that the Coalition’s cuts to international student numbers would be directed at elite universities such as Sydney, Melbourne, UNSW and Monash, which take in most foreign students.

The Coalition has given its strongest signal yet that it will target rich city universities such as Sydney, Melbourne, UNSW and Monash with its own student caps.Credit: Louise Kennerley

But the opposition has still not said how they would do so after sinking Labor’s new laws that would have introduced a mechanism for student caps last month.

The federal government on Thursday sought to get around the Coalition’s roadblock by launching a new way of slowing international student numbers without legislation: it will instruct departmental officials to put the brakes on processing student visa approvals once a university nears its government-set targets.

This replaces a previous direction that had slowed down visa processing, but only for regional universities. Under that scheme, Group of Eight universities benefited because they could keep recruiting students, mainly from China. The new measure will apply equally to all institutions.

The Group of Eight, which also includes the universities of Adelaide, Queensland, Western Australia and the Australian National University, on Thursday accused the government of replacing one flawed scheme with another.

“It has shifted the goalposts yet again,” said chief executive Vicki Thomson.

“We run the risk of confusing the international student market with these constant changes to policy settings. For too many potential students, it makes Australia look too hard and too unwelcoming as a higher education destination.”

Weihong Lang, international student officer at the Council of Australian Postgraduate Associations, agreed. “If they send this signal that students aren’t welcome, students will change their plan to go to Britain or Canada, because they don’t want to put their time at risk.”

Offshore applications from overseas students have already plummeted under government policies such as higher rejection rates, steeper visa application fees, tougher English language test requirements and fewer work rights.

International student numbers hover at an all-time high – with 677,144 visa holders in Australia during October, according to latest data – in part because onshore applications have been persistent. This has heightened the political pressure on Labor to bring numbers down.

Government ministers have sought to shift blame to Opposition Leader Peter Dutton, painting him as a fraud on immigration for opposing Labor’s student caps and then walking away from his original migration targets.

“Peter Dutton’s reckless arrogance killed the student cap and in the process he killed his credibility,” Education Minister Jason Clare said, insisting the government’s plans would make the sector fairer.

The opposition continues to attack Labor over continuing high international student enrolments, even as it withholds its own policy plans.

“Updating a ministerial direction on visa processing will do nothing to fix Labor’s immigration mess,” Coalition education spokeswoman Senator Henderson said.

She said Labor’s new ministerial direction was flawed because it retained numbers from the student cap scheme, which had allowed Group of Eight universities to keep recruiting the largest numbers of enrolments, even though it also issued them with greater proportionate cuts.

“By tying the new Ministerial Direction 111 to Labor’s flawed student caps scheme, the government will continue to drive excessive numbers of foreign students to Australia’s elite, metropolitan universities,” Henderson said.

“This open-slather approach places no limit on the number of foreign students who can come to Australia. The Coalition will impose a much tougher cap on foreign students at metropolitan universities which puts the needs of Australians first.”

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