TRANSCRIPT
In Melbourne’s north, 10 year old Shreyas Mayur is spending some rare face to face time with his grandma, Viji.
"When my mum is in India, my son, he has a tendency to spend hours on the phone just talking to her and trying to play games with her. It's really tricky to play a board game through Zoom, honestly, but he'll try! So he'll actually roll the dice for her and he will try to move the coins and try to... but I can tell that the bonding is really hard through the screen."
Viji's here on a tourist visa as the family wait for her parent visa application to be processed.
Her daughter, Supriya, says it's not easy knowing her mother is alone in India.
"So it's been almost five years for her, because it's 2025 now. So the reason is because at that time, actually, my dad passed away towards the end of 2020, so I'm an only child, so she's basically there all alone because her brothers and sisters, don't live in the same city. So she's living all by herself in that house there and it is getting pretty lonely because of that."
Viji is not alone.
Since Labor came to power the backlog of parent visa applications has ballooned from 120- to 150 thousand.
Despite doubling the annual intake and issuing nearly 26-thousand parents visas, the average wait time remains 31 years.
The wait time can be about half that, but only if you can pay 48,000 dollars.
For Supriya's husband Mayur, the cost is difficult to justify for a 14 year wait.
"If this was just a normal visa where it wasn't a contributory type, I understand, a 14 year wait, okay, fair enough. But this is contributory where we're playing a lot of money to bring her over here. So, certainly a 14 year wait, when you're paying so much. I don't think is reasonable."
A Migration Review commissioned by Labor in 2022 described the parent visa system as cruel and unnecessary.
Suggesting changes like a visa lottery or increasing temporary visas, the review also pointed out that the backlog could cause skilled migrants to look elsewhere.
Speaking to a Western Sydney forum during the campaign, the Prime Minister says he is aware of the issue.
"We need to bear in mind for many of the residents in Western Sydney, too. They don't want, people who are migrants, Mum and Dad to have no access here either."
But when asked by SBS ...
"Migrants don't want Mum and Dad to be locked out of the country. Will Labor increase the cap on parent visas?
"What we'll do is we'll work through an orderly migration program."
Meanwhile, the coalition has pledged to slash permanent migration by 25 per cent in an effort to free up housing.
Peter Dutton has maintained he’d reveal which visa categories he’d cut after the election.
That is until today.
"Is the coalition planning to cut parent visas?"
"We've said in relation to migration, and again this is a big difference between the two parties. We're going to cut migration by 25"
"Will you cut parent visas? "
"There's a significant contributor to young Australians locked out of housing."
"Will you reduce parent visas?"
"In relation to parents, I've been clear about this - it's an important part - an important part of the migration program. And we're not going to reduce those."
Under pressure over high migration, Labor has had little appetite to address the growing parent visa backlog, even as demand for skilled migrants grows.
As the Coalition pledges to slash permanent migration to free up housing - the question remains - which visas would be cut?
Abul Rizvi is the former Immigration Department Deputy Secretary, he says it will likely be parent visas.
"Mr Dutton's announcement that he will reduce the migration program from 185,000 to 140,000. Undoubtedly the first category he will cut is parents."
While cost of living reigns supreme in the suburbs, it's not the only issue that will sway voters.
"I'm not going to be casting a vote based on a major economic policy because that actually wouldn't be something I'm looking into that much, but this is something that actually cuts close to home."
With this message for both major parties in an election that could be won or lost in the outer suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne.
"Thousands of people similar to us. Who are also waiting. So our request to the government, whoever that is, is to consider and not slash the parents visa, the contributory visa so that we can bring our family back here."
"I'd like the process to be speeded up for my immigration and people like me."
