Asylum seeker backlog slowly reducing but more needs to be done

Detailed summary

The asylum seeker backlog Labor inherited after Dutton and Pezzullo lost control of the onshore asylum caseload is slowly reducing; unscrupulous agents must now be the focus. read…

Reducing the asylum backlog is welcome but the Government needs to do more to counter the unscrupulous agents and labour hire companies involved, as well as removing unsuccessful asylum seekers, writes Dr Abul Rizvi.

LOSING CONTROL OF the asylum caseload has been a crucial factor leading to governments in Europe and North America losing the public’s trust in their ability to manage migration.

While it was former Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton and Home Affairs Secretary Mike Pezzullo who first lost control of the onshore asylum caseload in Australia from 2015, the new Labor Government acted very slowly to address the issue.

That is likely to have contributed to Australians losing trust in both the Coalition and Labor’s ability to manage migration and to be attracted to One Nation’s calls for mass deportation.

It was not until late 2023 Labor announced a $160 million strategy to address the massive and growing asylum backlog it inherited. That has started to reduce the backlog of asylum applications at both the primary stage (see Chart 1) and the review stage (see Chart 2).

Political failures, misinformation and poor leadership have fuelled anti-immigration sentiment and eroded public trust.

But reducing the asylum backlog is not sufficient. The Government needed to do more to counter the unscrupulous agents (registered or otherwise) and labour hire companies involved, as well as removing unsuccessful asylum seekers.

The problem of unscrupulous and prominent migration agents gaming the asylum system was highlighted by journalists Nick McKenzie and Amelia Ballinger in late 2022.

But it was not until well into 2026 that the Government started to take effective action against such agents. Why it waited so long remains a mystery.

Opening of the article, excerpted from Independent Australia. To read the rest, open the article on the publisher's site.