Australia has frozen new applications from private colleges and training organisations seeking to offer courses to international students, as the Albanese government ramps up efforts to tighten integrity across the sector amid mounting migration and housing debates.

From May 19, new applications to the Australian Skills Quality Authority (ASQA) for Commonwealth Register of Institutions and Courses for Overseas Students (CRICOS) registration will be suspended under powers enabled by last year’s Education Legislation Amendment (Integrity and Other Measures) Act 2025.

The suspension will remain in place until May 19, 2027, though valid applications lodged before May 19, 2026 will continue to be processed under existing arrangements.

The measures apply specifically to CRICOS registrations linked to international student delivery. They cover both applications from new providers and new CRICOS course applications from existing ASQA-regulated providers in the vocational education and training (VET) and English Language Intensive Courses for Overseas Students (ELICOS) sectors.

Public providers, including government schools, TAFEs and Table A universities, are exempt from the pause. Equivalent reserve powers also exist for higher education providers, though these have not been enacted.

Existing providers will still be permitted to add locations for courses they are already approved to deliver, while providers will also be able to replace superseded programs where necessary.

The move follows both the Nixon Review into exploitation of Australia’s visa system and the 2023 Migration Review, which identified significant integrity concerns across the international education sector and vulnerabilities in student visa pathways.

Labor had previously attempted to introduce legislation enabling caps on international student enrolments, though the proposal was blocked in the Senate by the Coalition and Greens.

Frankly, it raises suspicions when at the same time student numbers in these parts of the sector are moderating the regulator continues to see a rush of new market entrants
_{^{Julian Hill, assistant minister for international education}}

According to a Department of Education fact sheet released on Monday, the temporary suspension is intended to allow regulators to focus on existing applications, conduct deeper integrity checks and address concerns around “poor quality and non-genuine new market entrants”.

The department noted there are already more than 900 VET providers registered on CRICOS, with provider numbers rising by over 35% since 2021 amid concentrated growth in certain course areas and concerns around market oversaturation within the VET and ELICOS sectors.

Assistant minister for international education Julian Hill said Australia remained open to genuine students, but argued the country’s international education reputation depended on maintaining strong integrity settings.

“Suspending new registrations to teach international students VET or English language onshore is not a decision taken lightly,” said Hill. “It will allow the government to address integrity concerns about new market entrants and over-saturation in the international VET and ELICOS sectors.”

Hill added that regulators continued to see a “rush of new market entrants” despite student growth moderating in parts of the sector. “Frankly, it raises suspicions when at the same time student numbers in these parts of the sector are moderating the regulator continues to see a rush of new market entrants,” he said.

The tightening has contributed to growing uncertainty across the sector, with stakeholders reporting increased caution among students, parents and agents as visa outcomes become less predictable.

Australia’s ELICOS sector has meanwhile experienced a sharp downturn, with previous Department of Education data showing ELICOS commencements fell 35% year-on-year in 2025.

The measures have already drawn criticism from parts of the private education sector. Ian Pratt, managing director of Lexis English, argued the government was unfairly targeting independent providers rather than properly resourcing regulators to assess applications and enforce standards.

“Quality independent providers are not the problem here,” Pratt wrote on LinkedIn. “Many of the most innovative, student-focused and internationally responsive organisations in Australian education sit within the private sector.”

Pratt added that while the sector broadly supported integrity measures, “integrity is achieved through intelligent regulation and proper enforcement, not by telling the regulator to stop regulating”.

The broader tightening environment has also seen offshore student visa refusal rates rise sharply across key South Asian markets, with previous reporting from The PIE News showing offshore higher education refusal rates reached 69% for Nepal and 42% for India in the first three months of 2026.

The move also lands amid intensifying political pressure around migration and housing, after last week’s federal budget revealed net overseas migration would fall more slowly than previously forecast.

Forecasts were revised upwards from 260,000 in the December mid-year budget update to 295,000 in 2025/26, before easing to 245,000 the following year and stabilising at 225,000 beyond that.

Opposition leader Angus Taylor has meanwhile proposed linking migration levels to housing completions, with the Coalition signalling that international student numbers could face further scrutiny under any future migration cuts.