The White Australia policy was effectively abolished in stages over about 25 years, with key milestones as follows:
- In 1966, Prime Minister Harold Holt's Liberal government made significant changes to migration laws through the Migration Act 1966, ending racial discrimination in immigration selection and treating all migrants equally regardless of race or country of origin. This was the most important step toward abolishing the policy.
- The last vestiges of the White Australia policy were removed in 1973 by the Whitlam Labor government, which definitively ended racial elements of immigration law and introduced a policy of multiculturalism.
Thus, the policy was abolished gradually, with the major legal end marked by the Migration Act 1966 and completed in 1973.
