• Australia welcomed 31,500 arrivals from overseas in December 2020, marking an 18% jump from the previous month.
• But reduced caps on international arrivals, kickstarted by fears over a highly infectious new strain of coronavirus, could impact the upward trend.
• People leaving Australia on temporary student visas comprised nearly one in five departures in December.
• Visit Business Insider Australia’s homepage for more stories.

Australia’s overseas arrivals jumped by 18% to 31,500 in December, but the new year presents harsh realities for international students, tourists, and Aussies still hoping to fly back home.

Provisional data released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics on Monday shows more Australian citizens returned from overseas in December 2020 than any month since April 2020, when Australians flocked home in the immediate aftermath of the international travel ban.

ABS Director of Migration Statistics, Jenny Dobak, said the increase in Aussie nationals touching down on home soil was the result of eased caps on repatriation flights, the one-way New Zealand-Australia travel ‘bubble’, and the reintroduction of Victoria’s hotel quarantine scheme.

“In Victoria, the lifting of restrictions saw over 5,300 overseas arrivals in December compared with just over 500 in the previous month,” Dobak said.

While the December figures are encouraging, they may not last. Earlier this month, the National Cabinet revealed passenger arrival caps in NSW, QLD, and WA will be slashed by 50% in response to a new and highly transmissible coronavirus strain.

The ABS data also suggests international students are continuing to hightail it out of Australia, with student visa holders comprising nearly one in five December departures.

There’s more disappointing news for students hoping to return, too. Speaking on Monday, Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews told reporters it would be “incredibly challenging, if not impossible” to welcome tens of thousands of international students back to the state in 2021.

While December marked a 9.8% increase in departures compared to the previous month, the total figure stands at just 12,090 – down 98.1% from the Christmas rush of December 2019. Just over one in five departures over the month were Australian citizens.

Those sobering figures are backdropped by Health Department Secretary Professor Brendan Murphy’s prediction that Australia’s borders will remain closed for the duration of 2021.

“It’s likely that quarantine [restrictions] will continue for some time,” Professor Murphy told ABC News Breakfast on Monday, even if COVID-19 vaccines are the “light at the end of the tunnel”.

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