Late last year, the The Australian Population Research Institute (TAPRI) released detailed polling showing that only 19% of respondents supported pre-COVID levels of immigration, with 70% wanting lower levels of immigration (of which 48% want significantly lower or zero immigration):
The overwhelming majority (69%) of Australians also did not believe that Australia needs more people:
A few weeks back, Fairfax published more polling showing that 65% of Aussies want immigration to be restarted at a lower level than existed pre-pandemic and only 22% want the same or higher:
Yesterday in The Conversation, vocal long-time supporter of ‘Big Australia’ immigration – Abul Rizvi – suggested Australian voters were racist for wanting lower immigration levels post COVID than existed pre-pandemic:
Rizvi also labelled the Sustainable Australia Party (SAP) – of whom I am a member – of being “just One Nation in disguise” when their only similarity is that they support historical levels of immigration, not the extreme levels experienced in the 15 years leading-up to COVID:
This is not the first time Abul Rizi has resorted to such attacks. Two years ago, under his avatar of Wiz, Rizvi labelled me a “bigot” for supporting historical immigration levels:
Accusing somebody of racism is the easiest and laziest way to shut down debate on immigration. Yet talking about immigration numbers has absolutely nothing to do with race.
Time and again, Australia comes out at the top of the most inclusive and racially tolerant countries. How is this possible if we are so racist towards immigration?
Moreover, the majority of non-English speaking groups also support lower immigration, according to TAPRI survey:
Does that make them racist too?
The truth is that Australians are not opposed to immigration, just the extreme volumes that were experienced in the 15 years leading up to COVID, which was well over double the historical average:
For obvious reasons, Australians do not support returning to these extreme levels of immigration post-pandemic, nor the 235,000 per year immigration projected by the Intergenerational Report (IGR), which is projected to swell Australia’s population by 13.1 million people (a 50% increase) over the next 40 years – equivalent to adding another Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane to Australia’s existing population:
In the 20 years leading up to COVID, Australia’s population increased by 6.5 million people – exactly half the level projected by the IGR, with Sydney and Melbourne each adding around 1.6 million and 1.8 million people respectively over that time.
Thus, if Australia’s population was to follow the IGR’s projected trajectory, we would effectively twice repeat the population growth experienced over 2000 to 2020, with Sydney and Melbourne each growing by another 3.2 million and 3.6 million people respectively over the next 40 years!
Australians know that the pre-COVID mass immigration program was managed appallingly and crush loaded everything in sight, resulting in widespread infrastructure bottlenecks across Australia’s major cities and reduced liveability. Because they lived it.
Australians, therefore, know that repeating the experience twice over again, as projected by the IGR, is the very definition of insanity. It has absolutely nothing to do with “racism”.
