One Nation policy targets 750,000 temporary visa holders

By Margaret Hale · 2026-09-15

The arithmetic of removal

Most migration debates proceed by mood: too many, not enough, the wrong kind. One Nation, on 14 September 2026, did something rather more clarifying and published a number. The party would remove more than 750,000 temporary visa holders over three years, driving net overseas migration below zero before settling at a long-run cap of 130,000 a year.^[1] The figure reads as either a serious policy or a serious provocation, and the reaction from both major parties suggested they thought it was both.

Three levers, one direction

The mechanism has three main parts. Student visa grants would be capped at 100,000 annually; there were 477,890 student visa holders in Australia as at 31 December 2025, meaning the cap would apply to a category already more than four times its proposed ceiling.^[2] Secondary family visas attached to skilled workers, roughly 70,000, would be abolished entirely.

The third lever carries the hardest edge. Temporary visa holders who have overstayed their conditions would receive three months to leave voluntarily, and those who remain beyond that deadline would face a lifetime ban on returning to Australia.^[1] The policy does not specify how overstayers would be identified, or what enforcement capacity would be deployed to find them.

What a quarter of 3 million looks like

Australia counted 3,027,695 temporary visa holders as at 31 December 2025, spanning student, skilled, visitor and working holiday-maker categories.^[2] Removing 750,000 of them represents roughly a quarter of that cohort in three years, a pace that would run directly into the revenue structures of universities and the seasonal labour arrangements of farms, whatever one thinks of the policy's political merits.

The migration numbers have already shifted substantially. Net overseas migration peaked at 556,000 for the year ending June 2023, fell to 429,000 by June 2024, and reached 306,000 by June 2025.^[3] One Nation's plan would take that trajectory into negative territory before any long-run cap applied.

Pauline Hanson, in framing the policy, said that the number of temporary visa holders in Australia had reached an all-time record high of 3 million, three months before the usual yearly peak in March.^[4] The implication was that the system had outrun its own seasonal patterns, and that a sharp correction was warranted rather than incremental adjustment.

Modelling wanted, recession warnings issued

The political response divided along predictable lines, except that the criticism came from the right as readily as from the left. Coalition senator Jonno Duniam said the plan could destroy the economy; Liberal MP Zoe McKenzie warned it would cause a recession. Neither could point to economic modelling from One Nation showing how the removal of 750,000 workers, students and visa holders over three years would affect GDP, employment or wages.

That demand for modelling echoed a broader complaint about migration policy across the parliament. Health and Ageing Minister Mark Butler said that one cannot overhaul migration without putting a number on it, specifying what areas are going to be cut, and being upfront with people.^[5] One Nation has now put a number on it; the modelling behind that number remains unpublished.

The policy is scheduled for full release ahead of the next federal election, and the 130,000 long-run annual cap would represent a reduction of more than half against the 306,000 net figure recorded in the year to June 2025.^[3]

Margaret Hale

Margaret Hale writes about politics, policy and the culture of business. She is drawn to the people behind decisions and to the moments when a political story turns out to be a human one.