It seems strange that while untold hordes languish in refugee camps in nearby Asian countries and many risk their lives on the high seas on people smuggler's boats trying to reach Australia, a quarter of all incoming migrants come in the door legally as intended marriage partners.
Last year fifty thousand new arrivals gained entrance as either intended brides or grooms, fiances or fiancees - or gay marriage partners and this was more than a 3% increase on the previous year - and a whopping 45% higher than the numbers for a decade earlier.
It is interesting to dissect the countries of origin of this steady stream of marriage partners. Successful applications were 5366 from China, 5175 from India, 4339 from the UK, 3331 from the Philippines and 2832 from Vietnam. A further 27,000 Kiwis came from New Zealand without visa restrictions.
The law has been gradually tightened to weed out the use of this way of entry to circumvent the long queues for legal migration. Mock marriages - arranged for a fee - were once prevalent. The incoming partner was granted that ever valuable visa and after a timely interval the marriage was dissolved through the divorce courts - and the newly freed bride or groom was now a legal citizen with Australian nationality.
One of the filters that shines the light on these intended relationships is the processing time for such visa applications - which stretch out to more than twelve months. They must work their way through the queue under constant scrutiny and once granted they are subjected to constant survey to detect fraud. This is no longer a rubber stamp entry with no further followup.
It is also not cheap. The $7,000 fee has been recently brought into line for applications made within Australia and from the intended home country of the marriage partner and this delivers over $ 300 million to Australian government coffers each year. It seems certain that a portion of the application fee is used to fund the ongoing investigation to ensure these marriage intentions are genuine.
No doubt psychologists and scientists who delve into the mysteries of motivation and race integration will be having a look at this phenomenon. To a certain degree the urge of some parents to see their progeny wedded within their own race group will see some of this flow be on the basis of " arranged marriages " and many others could be the by-product of the surge of International dating introduction agencies - which pair couples across a broad spectrum - for a fee.
We Australians are also enthusiastic travellers - and as a developed country we have the money to indulge our whims. The overseas holiday is well within the reach of most people and with that comes the opportunity to find romance - sometimes in far places. Perhaps much of this flow stems from the "boy meets girl " or "girl meets boy " scenario so popular with fiction writers !
It seems that the world regularly faces imbalances between the sexes that needs balancing between countries. The slaughters of both the first and second world war diluted the numbers of eligible young men and now the one child policy implemented earlier by China has produced a propoderance of males, many who will fail to find a bride in China.
The gene pool in Australia is constantly changing and being refreshed with new arrivals that add to our culture and increase our diversity. It is also evident that most of this flow is a younger age group, helping to balance the age mix and keep industry competitive. It is something to be welcomed and not feared. This has been a country of migrants from it's earliest days. Even the people here before white settlement once came from somewhere else !
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