Immigration (Fiscal Sustainability and System Integrity) Amendment Bill

An overview of the 10 amendments:
Immigration (Fiscal Sustainability and System Integrity) Amendment Bill – summary of amendments [PDF, 478 KB]

Here are brief descriptions of each change. 

Amendments to enable immigration costs to be shared more fairly

The Bill makes 2 changes to improve the fiscal sustainability of the immigration system:

• Expand the immigration levy payer-base, so immigration system costs are more fairly shared across the users of the system (currently only visa applicants are required to pay the levy).
• Create a new immigration levy making power to expand the purposes immigration levy revenue can be used for.

The levy amendments are enabling only – no new charges will be set until a formal fee and levy review (which will include consultation with stakeholders) is undertaken. No review is currently on the Immigration Policy work programme. 

Amendments in response to the recommendations of independent reviews of the immigration system

The Bill makes 3 amendments to implement recommendations from the Michael Heron, King's Counsel (KC) and Victoria Casey, (KC) independent reviews of the immigration system:

• 2023 Michael Heron KC review into out-of-hours immigration compliance activity [PDF, 946 KB]
• 2022 Victoria Casey QC review into the detention of asylum seekers [PDF, 626 KB]

In response to these reviews, the Bill proposes to: 

• Require immigration officers to obtain a judicial warrant prior to conducting out-of-hours residential compliance visits (a recommendation of the Heron Review). This is to ensure immigration compliance powers exercised outside of hours are justified, reasonable and proportionate.
• Improve protections for people who have claimed refugee or protected person status, and who are the subject of an application for a warrant of commitment (a recommendation of the Casey review). This is by establishing bespoke settings for the detention of this cohort that take into account their unique circumstances and vulnerabilities, and better align with New Zealand’s international obligations.
• Establish electronic monitoring as a lesser form of restriction of movement than detention, where appropriate (a recommendation of the Casey review). Currently if people are subject to restrictions of movement, the only options available are detention or an agreement about where the individual will live. This change will provide more graduated compliance options. 

Amendments to strengthen immigration risk settings and address gaps in migrant exploitation offences

The Bill seeks to improve the integrity and responsiveness of the immigration system by:

• Addressing a gap in New Zealand’s migrant exploitation settings by making it an offence to knowingly seek or receive a premium for employment from a migrant or intending migrant. This offence will apply irrespective of whether they have started work. Currently the offence only covers people actively working in New Zealand, and who were charged the premium by an employer. 
• Amend the definition of a mass arrival group to capture all possible ways a mass arrival group may enter the country. The current definition excludes people arriving on a scheduled international service, which means such a group could not be managed through New Zealand’s bespoke mass arrivals response framework.
• Create the power for the Minister of Immigration to cancel residence class visas of individuals who pose a threat or risk to security but cannot currently be deported because of a credible chance they would be tortured.
• Clarify that deportation liability for residence class visa holders is a consequence of criminal offending (that is, a person is liable for deportation if they plead guilty, are found guilty, or are convicted of criminal offending). This is a change from the status quo, which solely requires a person to be convicted in order to trigger deportation liability.  

Amendment to ensure the system can respond more flexibly to challenges

This amendment will enable the Minister of Immigration to make decisions to grant or amend visas in the absence of applications, and in response to circumstances that are unusual, unable to be accommodated within existing frameworks, or outside the Department’s control.

The amendment will be accompanied by several safeguards, including that the powers can only be used to benefit (or at least not disadvantage) the people they apply to.  

Next steps

The Immigration (Fiscal Sustainability and System Integrity) Amendment Bill was introduced on 7 April 2025 and is now going through the parliamentary process. 

Proactively released documents

Go to all Immigration (Fiscal Sustainability and System Integrity) Amendment Bill proactive releases(external link)