One Nation MP Barnaby Joyce has hit back at critics of his party's migration policy, defending its decision not to model the economic cost of slashing the number of temporary visa holders in Australia.
The pushback came as Labor continued work behind closed doors on its own migration reforms. One Nation leader Pauline Hanson beat the government to the punch, unveiling a plan to cut the number of temporary visa holders and overstayers by more than 750,000 over three years.
International student visas would bear the brunt of the cuts. Visa grants would fall from more than 290,000 a year to 115,000, and secondary visas for family members would be scrapped altogether. The policy outline, distributed on Monday, did not include any assessment of its economic impact.
Joyce dismissed criticism that the policy had not been modelled or costed by the Parliamentary Budget Office. "They're not elected. I am," he told the ABC's National Forum on Monday night, questioning the quality of analysis produced by government agencies.
"I've never seen forward estimates in any budgetary paper being even close to the mark of what it's supposed to do, and so the will of the Australian people is so pronounced. This has to be dealt with," he said.
Asked whether skilled migrants would still choose to come to Australia if they could not bring their children or spouses, Joyce said that was a decision for the individual to make.
Experts warned that three straight years of negative migration, as One Nation has pledged to deliver, has never happened in Australia except during periods of severe economic stress or during World War II.
Industry and Coalition reaction
Industry Minister Tim Ayres said the plan, if implemented, would be "a wrecking ball through regional economies." "It would hurt the agriculture sector. It would hurt the hospitality and the aged care sectors in particular," he said.
Coalition immigration spokesman Jonathon Duniam said he would not be copying One Nation's work and promised an alternative policy in time. "I would never copy a piece of work that has not been modelled, has not been costed. We don't understand the impact," he told News24.
Impact on universities
One Nation's plan to slash the international student intake could clear the backlog of temporary visa applicants clogging the appeals system, but it could also "decimate" the university sector, according to industry figures.
International Education Association of Australia chief executive Phil Honeywood said governments had forced universities to rely on foreign student fees to balance their books. "The types of changes proposed will decimate an industry that employs 250,000 Australians and crucially keeps our public universities afloat," he told AAP.
Growing numbers of international students and their families remaining in Australia on bridging visas have been a major contributor to net overseas migration overshooting the government's forecasts in recent years.
Visa appeals backlog
As the Home Affairs department has ramped up refusals for student visa applications, the number of students launching appeals with the Administrative Review Tribunal has surged. The total number of migration and refugee cases being assessed by the tribunal almost doubled between July 2024 and July 2026.
Earlier in 2026, Labor passed legislation changing how the tribunal conducts hearings for student visa appeals, aiming to speed up processing and cut the backlog. A limit on in-person hearings for student visas took effect on June 1 and has shown some early promise, though the student visa backlog still grew to 53,608 cases by the end of July.
Honeywood said there was evidence a minority of international students were gaming the system, and that recent federal government changes have tried to clamp down on it. "Unfortunately that has developed a lawyers' picnic that allows any number of appeals and the Albanese government are finding ways to reduce appeal rights for non-genuine students," he said.
One Nation has promised to end what it calls "visa-hopping" by preventing students from applying for repeat visas and requiring most visa applications to be made from overseas.
