The Gold Coast wants to be classified as 'regional' to bring in more migrants

The Gold Coast is lobbying to be reclassified from 'metro' to 'regional' under Australia’s migration system in order to bring in more skilled migrants and international students. But some say the city already has enough advantage.

Gold Coast universities say they'll be disadvantaged if international student incentives do no apply to them. Source: Getty

The Gold Coast wants to be reclassified as a regional area so it can boost its number of skilled migrants and international students.

The south-east Queensland city is classed as 'metro' under the federal government’s migration program, alongside Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane and Perth. 

That means the Gold Coast won’t benefit from new visas and incentives set to be introduced next month as part of the federal government’s push to ease congestion in the cities and encourage migrants and international students to go regional.

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