[CollegeGirl]

Sorry, but it is an Australian citizen spouse.

They spell it out better in the Australian Citizenship Instructions, found here:
http://www.citizenship.gov.au/_pdf/acis-july-2013.pdf

On Page 51, it states:

Periods spent overseas by a permanent resident who is the spouse, de facto partner or surviving spouse or de facto partner of an Australian citizen at the time of making an application, can be counted as periods of permanent residence in Australia.

 

[CollegeGirl]

Doubtful you're going to find anyone here who's done that. I've only seen it mentioned a handful of times on various forums, ALL of those people were married to Aussie citizens, and rarely do people come back and say whether they succeeded or not. I've maybe seen two people who came back to say they were successful (and they were married to Aussie citizens, for a long time).

I can tell you that agents on this board have reported that it is VERY difficult to get ministerial discretion in general right now with the current government. And you're not even married to a citizen.

I understand the desire to make it work, but I think you're barking up the wrong tree here.

 

[CollegeGirl]

Right, but other agents on here have said that getting Ministerial Intervention for partner visa cases (such as those that were denied at MRT) is pretty difficult these days. Has that not been your experience, or does that not apply because it's a different situation? Either way, pretty clear OP isn't going to qualify for it anyway given he's not married to an Aussie citizen.