Australia: Reforms Announced for Working Holiday Makers, Students, and Skilled Workers
On 17 September, Immigration Minister Tony Burke announced a package of changes intended to bring annual net migration down from 300,000 to 225,000 by 2028. Four pieces stand out.
Working holidaymakers. Young travelers on Australia’s working holiday visa can currently earn a second and then a third year by completing a stint of regional work. That work will still count, but it now only enters them into a lottery rather than securing the visa. Second-year places are capped at 45,000, against roughly 57,000 people who qualified last year. Third-year places fall to 5,000, against about 31,000. British citizens remain exempt from the regional work requirement altogether under the UK-Australia trade agreement.
Students and recent graduates. New student and graduate visa holders will generally no longer be able to bring a spouse or children with them. Nationals of Pacific and ASEAN countries and PhD candidates are exempt, and anyone already in Australia with family attached to their visa is unaffected.
Visitors. More visitor visas will carry a condition preventing the holder from applying for a different visa without first leaving the country.
Skilled workers. The points test will place greater weight on housing and construction trade qualifications, with tradespeople qualified in high-demand areas scoring at levels broadly equivalent to university qualifications. Processing priorities are also being adjusted, adding agriculture, resources, and fisheries alongside construction, teaching, and healthcare.
Thailand: Visa-Free Stays Dropped to 30 Days on September 15
Four Interior Ministry regulations published in the Royal Gazette on 31 August repealed the 60-day visa exemption Thailand introduced in 2024, and the replacement framework took effect on 15 September. Sixty countries and territories keep visa-exempt entry, now capped at 30 days for tourism, with a single extension of up to 30 further days available at immigration’s discretion. Land-border entries are generally limited to two per calendar year. The wrinkle for employers is that the outgoing exemption accommodated certain short-term business activities, so anyone accustomed to dropping into Thailand for a few weeks of client work on a passport stamp is now working with half the runway. Travelers admitted on or before 14 September kept the longer stay they were granted, but that grandfathering runs out as those admissions expire — anyone currently in Thailand on a pre-15 September entry should check what they were actually given rather than assume.
Denmark: A New Employer-Sponsored Route Opens January 1
Denmark has approved the Collective Agreement-Based Business Scheme, a work permit route for certified employers effective 1 January 2027. It covers nationals of sixteen countries, including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, India, Brazil, China, Japan, Singapore, and Australia. The draw is the salary floor: DKK 322,000 at 2026 levels, which generally falls below other salary threshold requirements in Denmark. The employer must be covered by a relevant Danish collective agreement, must hold certification from the Danish Agency for International Recruitment and Integration, and the role itself must fall within that agreement. Certification runs three years initially, then renews in four-year terms. Detailed guidance is expected closer to launch, so employers who want to use the route early in the year should begin the certification conversation this autumn rather than in December.