I am an Australian aged pensioner having lived in Thailand for 5 years & married a Thai lady (now 50 yo).

As the only assets we have in Thailand is a house & vehicle, I am concerned as to what will happen to my wife when I eventually fall off my peg!

My wife will have no income when I am no longer here, does anyone know whether she would be eligible for a widows pension from the Australian government. My wife has suffered from breast cancer and does not have many prospects of employment. We also are bringing up a grandchild (presently 3yo) which his mother doesn't really want & could not (thankfully) even successfully abort!

Would we need to shift to Australia in order to secure their future? I did loose part of my pension when I declared my marital status to Australian Centrelink but surprisingly, after talking to the Hobart office of Centrelink & explaining my situation my single pension was restored along with a back payment of about $2,000. I also do get a small allowance for my step grand child.

I have not approached Australian Centrelink about this yet.

Does anyone have any advice please? (I am currently about to turn 72).

i dont know alot about this but if you did move back to Austalia , wont your wife have to apply for citzenship first? This takes about 4 years .. Sorry I cant help you .Maybe go to centrelink website.

talk to centrelink. guaranteed the correct answer.

good luck mate.

Baqsicly she has no hope of securing her future. Age pensions there require long periods of residence....10 to 35 years and if you want her to be eligible for the age pension when she is about 67 you will have to move there now and stay there.

i dont know alot about this but if you did move back to Austalia , wont your wife have to apply for citzenship first? This takes about 4 years .. Sorry I cant help you .Maybe go to centrelink website.

According to the Australian website an application for a resident visa takes about 6 months, however one can get a provisional visa and go there on that. This is valid only until the resident visa application is being considered. I believe then one can apply for citizenship after being in the country for two years. I am actually a Kiwi but have dual citezinship. In those times we did not even need a passport to travel from NZ to Australia. I applied for Australian citezinship in 1972 when Gough Witlam gave a time limit for NZ citezins could apply before having to go through the naturalisation process along with migrants from all the other countries.