A DEFUNCT nationalistic political party is taking advantage of the current turmoil surrounding foreign students with a campaign demanding they "go home".

The Australia First Party has been distributing pamphlets calling for an end to the "overseas student rort".

The material claims foreign students are driving up property prices, pushing domestic students out of university places and taking their part-time jobs.

EducationNow has obtained a copy of the leaflet and understands they were distributed around North Tce outside the University of Adelaide last month.

The contact number on the back of the leaflet is the message line for the party's NSW branch. It is not registered in South Australia.

Calls to the number yesterday and on Friday went unanswered, however its NSW website has an "overseas students go home" link under its news items (but no material is attached).

The pamphlet was condemned by Further Education Minister Michael O'Brien, who said it was "incredibly insular".

"I find it - on a personal level - quite offensive and, in a practical sense, inane in that overseas students basically provide the financial underpinning for our university system," he said.

The party, which was deregistered by the Australian Electoral Commission in 2004 for not contesting two federal elections, was founded by former Labor MP Graeme Campbell (who left to stand for One Nation in 2001). Its policies included cutting immigration and abolishing multiculturalism.

Study Adelaide, which markets SA schools and universities overseas, also rebuffed the party's claims.

Chief executive Denise Von Wald said it was "illegal" for publicly-funded universities to provide places for international students at the expense of subsidised domestic students.

She said the assaults on predominantly Indian students interstate was resonating negatively overseas.

"There would be parents in India who are worried about their children because of the resultant media coverage but our local institutions have been proactive in supplying information about support networks that are available to students who are feeling vulnerable," she said.

An inter-agency taskforce set up to deal with the issue - headed by national security adviser Duncan Lewis - held its first meeting last week and Education Minister Julia Gillard plans to hold a round table. The issue has surged up the political agenda, with Prime Minister Kevin Rudd's homepage at pm.gov.au features a statement in support of the 90,000 Indian students in Australia.

Victoria has set up a hotline for Indian students who are the victims of crime: 1800 342 800.