The AFR’s Laura Tingle is the latest to jump on the immigration debate, accusing politicians of burying the issue despite its massive impacts on the economy and society:
One of the ways governments try to signal their changing priorities to voters is to change the names of ministerial portfolios and government agencies…
Since 1945, there has always been a minister for immigration… But times have moved on and, some time next year, the title of Minister for Immigration will be subsumed into the Turnbull government’s new super portfolio of Home Affairs…
Why does it matter? Well, because the downgrading reflects the spooky silence around all issues to do with population that has developed in our political debate over the past decade, and which only becomes more conspicuous with this week’s move.
…But the role our migration program plays in the economy? Well, not so much. This is despite the fact that the number of people coming to Australia, who want to have somewhere to live, and a job or a place at one of our learning institutions, has a huge impact on both our rate of economic growth and on the demands for housing and infrastructure…
…The aversion to talking about the number of people coming back to Australia particularly stems back to Kevin Rudd’s advocacy of a “Big Australia” …
Since the time of this debate in 2010, the population has already grown from around 22 million to 24 million.
The reality is that neither major party knows exactly how to frame a discussion about our population without igniting ugliness from various quarters who might jump in with their own agendas.
In my interview with News.com.au’s Frank Chung, published earlier this week, I explained how immigration and Australia’s future population size is the debate that Australians are not allowed to have, ignored completely by the main political parties or shut down as “racist” and “xenophobic” by supporters of open borders.
This comes despite Australia’s immigration program running at roughly triple the historical average since 2003, which is projected to continue for decades, thus creating all manner of pressures on infrastructure, housing and overall living standards.
As I noted in the News.com.a interview, “the problem isn’t that immigration is good or bad, it’s just that the level is far too high for Australia to digest… It’s clearly unsustainable”.
In its recent Migrant Intake Australia report, the Productivity Commission explicitly called for community consultation as well as a national population strategy. So why are our mainstream politicians ignoring the whole population and immigration issue? An Australia of 27 million by 2060 (under zero net overseas migration) would be a very different place to an Australia of more than 40 million (under current settings). Why aren’t Australians been given a choice on the matter?
The reality is that Australians’ views been never been sought over how big they want Australia to become. For this reason, Australian’s deserve to have a plebiscite seeking their views about the nation’s future population size, the answers of which would then be used to formulate Australia’s immigration intake to meet the said target.
It’s the democratic thing to do.
