For applicants of non-contributory parent visas, which provide permanent residency for a fee of just under $9,000, the wait times are now an estimated 33 years.<\/a><\/p>\n Contributory parent visas have waiting times of about 15 years but cost almost $50,000 each.<\/p>\n Ji Tu, a Sydney-based surgical trainee, says Australia was his first choice to raise his family and build a career.<\/p>\n But as the father of two faces years of uncertainty over when his parents will be able to settle permanently in Australia, he says he has considered moving abroad.<\/p>\n \u201cWhat\u2019s the point if I just stay here taking care of the old Australian patients, but I couldn\u2019t take care of my own parents?<\/p>\n \u201cWe want to continue building our lives and careers in Australia, but we also hope our children can grow up surrounded by their grandparents.\u201d<\/p>\n Tu\u2019s parents, aged 57 and 67, are in Australia\u2019s parent visa queue, which has a decades-long backlog for some categories.<\/p>\n Tu has been waiting more than three years for his parents to have their applications processed. While in China, the pair lodged applications for contributory parent visas.<\/p>\n According to the current wait times,<\/a> Tu\u2019s parents\u2019 visas will not be processed until at least 2038 \u2013 when his oldest child is almost 15 years old.<\/p>\n For Tu and his wife, having parental support allows them to manage demanding work hours while raising their two children.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s mental support and extra support for our new immigrants,\u201d he says. \u201cEssentially this could help us \u2026 work and to build our career in Australia.\u201d<\/p>\n His parents are in Australia on temporary visas but are required to leave for six-month stints every 18 months.<\/p>\n \u201cMy parents are getting older. I\u2019m really anxious about it,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n The home affairs minister, Tony Burke, this week delayed a speech at the National Press Club<\/a> where he was due to reveal a migration overhaul. But Labor is still expected to introduce new rules to cut net overseas migration, and push some temporary residents to leave Australia.<\/p>\n The proposed reform includes preventing spouses, children and parents of Australian citizens from applying for visas while in the country as tourists, the ABC reported.<\/p>\n skip past newsletter promotion<\/a>Free newsletter | When needed<\/p>\n Sign up to Breaking News Australia<\/p>\n Get the most important news as it breaks<\/p>\n after newsletter promotion<\/p>\n \u2018They need somebody looking after them\u2019<\/p>\n Ruby Liu, a 33-year-old engineer, has been waiting seven years for her 69-year-old mother\u2019s contributory visa application to be processed. Her father died in a car accident about five months after the pair lodged their applications from China in 2019.<\/p>\n Liu says she fears a recent ministerial direction<\/a>, which prioritises family visa applications made onshore, will mean her mother\u2019s offshore application is deprioritised.<\/p>\n \u201cThis worries me every day,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n Ruby Liu with her mother in Sydney. Photograph: supplied<\/p>\n Liu\u2019s mother lived in Australia on temporary visas after her husband\u2019s death but returned to China in February after her visa expired. She often tells her daughter, an only child, that she longs to return home to the Sydney unit they shared.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s a huge pressure on me because I cannot change the policy,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen \u2026 parents get old \u2026 they need somebody looking after them.\u201d<\/p>\n Department of Home Affairs data, provided to Senate estimates last month, revealed that between 1 July 2024 and 31 March 2026, 1,536 parent visa applicants died while waiting for a visa.<\/p>\n At the end of the 2024-25 financial year, there were more than 157,000 applicants in the parent visa backlog, the department\u2019s latest annual report shows<\/a>. This financial year, the annual allocation for parent visas<\/a> fell from 8,500 to 7,060.<\/p>\n Abul Rizvi, a former deputy secretary of immigration, said Australia had the \u201charshest parent [visa] policy of any comparable nation on the planet\u201d.<\/p>\n He said the reported overhaul showed the federal government was worried that people were using a visitor visa pathway to enter Australia and then apply for a parent visa onshore, enabling them to remain on a bridging visa for decades.<\/p>\n \u201cThat is what they want to stop,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n A 2023 expert review of<\/a> Australia\u2019s migration system warned that long waiting periods make \u201cthe probability of successful migration virtually nonexistent for many applicants\u201d.<\/a><\/p>\n Referring to wait times for parent visas of 30-50 years given the age of applicants, it said: \u201cProviding an opportunity for people to apply for a visa that will probably never come seems both cruel and unnecessary.\u201d<\/p>\n The Department of Home Affairs was approached for comment but did not respond by the deadline.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Navjot Singh Kailay is all-too familiar with the \u201chorror stories\u201d of Australia\u2019s family visa system. The families facing…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":845843,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-845842","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/845842","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=845842"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/845842\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/845843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=845842"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=845842"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=845842"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/2998.jpg\")
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