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Australia’s new skilled visa queue and where Indian applicants now stand
Indian citizens received 43,634 of the 132,148 places in Australia’s 2024-25 Skill stream, about one in every three, according to the Department of Home Affairs. Since 19 September 2026, the order in which applications for Australia’s main skilled visas are processed has been set by two new ministerial directions. For Indian nationals waiting on a decision, the question is simple: has the queue moved in their favour or against them?
Two directions now set the skilled visa queue
Ministerial Directions 121 and 122 took effect on 19 September 2026, and from that date they “replaced all processing priorities under Ministerial Direction 119”, the department’s processing priorities page states. Both were signed by the Minister on 18 September 2026 and commence the day after signing.
Direction 121 covers temporary skilled visas: the Skills in Demand visa (subclass 482) and the Temporary Skill Shortage visa (subclass 482) that it replaced on 7 December 2024. Direction 122 covers ten provisional and permanent skilled visas: subclasses 186, 187, 189, 190, 191, 489, 491, 494 and 887, and the Business Skills (Permanent) visa, subclass 888.
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke flagged the change at the National Press Club on 17 September 2026, two days before it took effect. Under Direction 119, he said, “we’ve got a single one where we have almost identical rules for both the permanent program and the temporary program”.
The new order of the queue
For temporary skilled visas under Direction 121, Home Affairs lists five tiers:
- Applications relating to the construction, healthcare, teaching, agriculture, aquaculture, fishing and resources sectors, or Australia’s law enforcement and defence interests.
- Specialist Skills stream applications.
- Applications where the primary applicant was in Australia when they lodged.
- Applications where the primary applicant was outside Australia at lodgement and the application is not combined with another person’s application at any time.
- All other applications.
For provisional and permanent skilled visas under Direction 122, the order is the same minus the Specialist Skills tier: the seven priority sectors and law enforcement and defence roles first, then applicants who were in Australia at lodgement, then offshore primary applicants applying alone, then everyone else.
Both directions state that they apply to applications already lodged but not finally decided when they commenced, as well as to new ones. Undecided applications on 19 September 2026 are therefore processed under the new order, apart from excluded cases such as those sent back by the Administrative Review Tribunal.
How a priority sector is decided
The direction texts define construction, healthcare and teaching by lists of occupations from the Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupations (ANZSCO). Healthcare covers the whole Health Professionals group plus health and welfare support workers, psychologists, social workers, aged or disabled carers, nursing support workers and personal care assistants, among others. Construction covers construction trades workers and labourers, construction and engineering managers, architects, civil engineering professionals and electricians, among others. Teaching covers school teachers, principals, faculty heads, university lecturers, vocational education teachers and child care workers, among others.
The other sectors turn on what the position does or who sponsors it. Resources covers positions that directly support the exploration, extraction and production of minerals, oil and gas, or coal. Agriculture, aquaculture and fishing covers positions directly involved in primary production, including the processing of livestock, poultry and seafood. Law enforcement means police nominated or sponsored by the Australian Federal Police or a state or territory police force. Defence covers work on AUKUS, roles nominated or sponsored by the Australian Defence Force or the Department of Defence, and some roles backed by a Defence letter of support.
No information and communication technology occupation is named in the construction, healthcare, teaching or resources lists, although the resources and defence definitions turn on the work the position supports rather than on a closed list. Both directions also tell the decision maker to depart from the order where an application involves compelling circumstances, such as community safety or the continuity of essential religious, cultural or community services.
Onshore, offshore and family
Outside the priority sectors, and for temporary visas outside the Specialist Skills stream, an applicant who was in Australia at lodgement ranks above one who applied from overseas. For offshore applicants, family composition also matters. The tier for offshore applicants covers only applications “not combined with another person’s application at any time,” in the department’s words. An offshore applicant in a non-priority occupation who includes a partner or children therefore falls into the final tier, unless, for a temporary visa, they are in the Specialist Skills stream. Family members in a combined application take the same priority as the primary applicant, and the top tier has no location or family condition.
What changed from Direction 119
Direction 119, dated 24 July 2026, set one order for both temporary and permanent skilled visas. Police and defence applications came first, then healthcare, teaching and construction applicants, but only those who were in Australia when they applied. All other onshore applicants came next, and all offshore applicants came last, whatever their occupation.
Set side by side, the texts show three shifts. Offshore applicants in healthcare, teaching or construction occupations move from the last tier to the first. Onshore applicants outside the priority sectors still rank above offshore applicants in non-priority occupations, but now sit behind offshore applicants in priority ones. Offshore applicants in non-priority occupations who include family remain in the last tier, now behind offshore applicants who apply alone.
What it means for Indian applicants
Indian nationals are the largest national group in both the permanent and temporary skilled programs, Home Affairs data shows:
- India ranked first in the 2024-25 Migration Program, with 43,634 Skill stream places and 4,661 Family stream places.
- India ranked first for primary temporary skilled visa grants in the six months to 31 December 2025, with 6,220 grants, or 18.1 per cent of the total of 34,360, up 16.2 per cent on the same period a year earlier.
- At 31 December 2025, 17,660 Indian citizens held primary temporary skilled visas in Australia, again the highest of any country, out of 112,640 in total. New South Wales (6,960) and Victoria (5,750) were the nominated work locations for most of them.
Read against the directions, Indian applicants in the named sectors go to the front, wherever they applied from and whoever is on their application. Those already in Australia when they lodged in other occupations, including people moving from student or graduate visas, sit in the second tier for permanent visas, and in the third tier for temporary visas unless they are in the Specialist Skills stream.
Information technology, accounting and other professional applicants outside the named lists depend on the location and family tiers. The directions set the order of processing only: both state that they do not change the skilled occupation lists.
What Burke said about the points test
In the same address, Burke said the points test had been redone “in consultation with Treasury” and described a new feature: “We are also adding an unusual capacity there which hasn’t been there previously, which is within the points test to be able to choose particular skills which will have an uplift so that they will be viewed as though they were a higher level of qualification.”
The example he gave was the housing trades. Under the new points test, Burke said, “we will, on implementation, be making sure that anyone who is skilled in the housing trades will get the same number of points as though it were a university qualification, to make sure that we are getting the construction trades that we desperately need.” He gave no start date in the address.
He also addressed a claim he attributed to the Shadow Minister for Housing and Homelessness, Senator Andrew Bragg, that the Government is bringing in more yoga teachers than construction workers. Burke said yoga teachers were on the list because of an agreement the previous government made with India, but “in the light of this Government the number of yoga teachers we have brought in is zero.” On construction, he said the intake had tripled: “We used to bring 4,500, last financial year the number of construction workers we brought in was just shy of 15,000.”
The takeaway
The new queue puts the named priority sectors first and, outside them, favours applicants who were in Australia when they applied. For the Indian community, the largest source of skilled migrants, profession comes first: health, teaching and construction applicants are now in the top group wherever they applied from, while offshore applicants in other fields who apply with family sit in the last tier. Like Direction 119 before them, the new directions apply to applications already waiting, so the change on 19 September reordered people already in the queue.
