Australia's scientific brain drain

This opinion piece published in the Sydney Morning Herald the other day outlines a common experience for many researchers in Australia - the lack of a coherent government research and innovation strategy forces PhD graduates overseas for postdoctoral research. Many never return.

I don't want to repeat what is already said in this article, so I will instead add a few more examples of mismanagement I've seen in recent years:

• Multiple recipients of highly competitive Australian Research Council grants have had to wait for more than a year for their Australian work visas to be approved. Your project was ranked in the top 10% of submissions and "enhances the scale and focus of research in Australian Government priority areas", but you'll have to wait at the back of the visa queue, thanks!
• During the height of the covid pandemic foreigners were basically barred from entering Australia (requiring a visa to be approved, travel ban exemption, and one of few seats on incoming flights). At the same time, many Australians working in postdoctoral positions overseas decided to return (at great cost) and were desperate to find a local research job. Inflexible funding rules meant that certain research positions were being limited to candidates not in Australia and unable to travel there.
• The current government is prioritizing funding projects that can establish links between research and local industry. In many promising research areas there is no local industry to speak of, leading to world-class scientific proposals not being funded. And I'm not talking about the ARC Linkage grants (which are aimed at funding these kinds of partnerships), this is in relation to the Discovery Programme, which is supposed to fund pure science.

To sum up, I can respect that different governments may have different priorities for funding (or not funding) certain research. But it's appalling to see so many examples of policy being implemented so poorly.