The Morrison Government’s plan for Australia’s future population will ease the pressure on the big capitals while supporting the growth of those smaller cities and regions that want more people.

• Reducing the migration cap by 15%, from 190,000 to 160,000 places.
• Introducing two new regional visas for skilled workers requiring them to live and work in regional Australia for three years before being able to access permanent residence. 23,000 places will be set aside for these regional visas.
• Giving international students studying at regional universities access to an additional year in Australia on a post-study work visa.

The total program is broken down into the following streams:

• Skill – designed to improve the productive capacity of the economy and fill skill shortages in the labour market, including those in regional Australia. The majority of the places in the program are in the Skill stream (108,682 places in 2019-20, 69.5 per cent of the program). The number of Employer Sponsored skilled visa places increasing from 35,528 in 2017-18 to 39,000 places in 2019-20.
• Family – is predominately made up of Partner visas, enabling Australians to reunite with family members from overseas, and provide them with pathways to citizenship (47,732 places in 2019-20, 30.5 per cent of the program).
• Special Eligibility – this covers visas for those in special circumstances. This can include permanent residents returning to Australia after a period away, and is the smallest stream (236 places in 2019-20).
• At least 3,350 Child places will be available in 2019-20.

2019-20 Migration program planning levels：

The two new skilled regional provisional visas introduced in November 2019:

• Skilled Employer Sponsored Regional (Provisional) subclass 494 visa: for people sponsored by an employer in regional Australia. It substitutes 187(RSMS) visa.
• Skilled Work Regional (Provisional) subclass 491 visa: for people who are nominated by a State or Territory government or sponsored by an eligible family member to live and work in regional Australia. It substitutes the current 489 visa.

These new regional visas will provide greater incentives for regional employers to nominate skilled workers, including priority processing of applications and access to additional skilled occupations. Based on current eligible skilled occupation lists:

• Skilled Employer Sponsored Regional (Provisional) 494 visa will have almost 700 eligible occupations; and
• Skilled Work Regional (Provisional) 491 visa will have over 500 eligible occupations.

A new permanent visa pathway, the Permanent Residence (Skilled Regional) visa, will also be available for holders of the new regional provisional visas in November 2022. Subclass 489 visa holders will continue to be able to access the Subclass 887 (Skilled – Regional) visa which is the permanent pathway visa for this group, subject to satisfying existing criteria.

In November 2019, the definition of Regional Australia for all skilled visas will be simplified and expanded to include all of Australia except for the following metropolitan areas: Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Gold Coast, and Perth. The whole South Australia areas including Adelaide belong to Regional Australia. Therefore, Adelaide will be the preferred choice for future applicants.

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