Changes to Australian migration law and policy affecting visa refusals and reviews, newest first. Each update names the instrument or official source it comes from.
Full guide: Refusal and review All migration updates
The Department has released the number of Ministerial intervention requests received and finalised, and visas granted, for 2022-23 to 2025-26.
Who this affects: Anyone considering a request for Ministerial intervention after a Tribunal decision, or for a person in immigration detention.
The President of the Administrative Review Tribunal made a Generative AI Practice Direction on 20 August 2026. It takes effect from the day it was signed and applies to every application, whenever it was lodged.
Who this affects: Every party and representative in a Tribunal matter, legal or non-legal. It reaches applications lodged before 20 August 2026 as well as after, and it applies across all of the Tribunal’s jurisdictional areas, including migration and protection review.
The fee to review a migration decision is now $3,727 and a protection decision $2,293, and the new fees apply to any fee paid on or after 1 July 2026 even where the application was lodged before that date.
Who this affects: Anyone with an ART application lodged shortly before 1 July 2026 whose fee was not paid until after it. A financial hardship reduction of 50 per cent remains available on the migration fee, and the concessional fee of $100 is unchanged.
From 1 June 2026 the Administrative Review Tribunal must decide reviews of most student visa refusals without holding an oral hearing.
Who this affects: Anyone who has applied, or is about to apply, to the ART for review of a Subclass 500 refusal. It reaches back to applications already lodged: if a case has not yet been assigned to a Tribunal member, it falls under the new arrangement even though it was lodged earlier. A hearing date already given still goes ahead.
Send us the complete decision letter and the email or notification by which it was sent. We can check whether review rights exist, who may apply and the deadline.
