Amid a range of changes to visa provisions, the Federal Government has commenced a review of Australia’s business, investment and talent visas, including Significant and Premium Investor Visa (SIV and PIV).
New frameworks for the SIV and PIV were launched in July 2015 and a review is addressing the quantum of the venture capital and growth private equity (VCPE) investment requirement, as well as some minor technical details.
The Department of Immigration and Border Protection (DIBP) has published a consultation paper inviting the views on the current state of relevant programs to inform the review.
Austrade is responsible for the policy settings of the SIV and PIV complying investment framework and will lead this aspect of the review.
The review will not consider changes to the SIV/PIV complying investment framework settings as set agreed by the Government in mid-2015, with the exception of the quantum of the VCPE investment requirement and a small number of technical matters. The rationale is due to the enhanced framework largely working well and industry has devoted substantial resources to developing new products that comply with the enhanced rules.
When the new complying investment framework was introduced in July 2015, the Government announced it expected to increase the VCPE component to $1 million for new applications within two years as the market responded.
Further information on the specific SIV/PIV complying investment framework questions on which Austrade is inviting public comment is available here.
Comments to DIBP on the broader review (to icap@border.gov.au), and to Austrade on complying investment matters (to investorvisas@austrade.gov.au), are due by COB 31 July 2017.