AUSTRALIA’S immigration policy contains within it the seeds of our destruction.
And the pandemic has brought home to us just what a dangerous game we are playing.
An immigration policy without a population policy is like a rudderless ship. We are sailing somewhere but we don’t know where. Our course changes depending on prevailing conditions but there is no thought to our destination.
Despite numerous attempts, Australia has never settled on a population policy. We have never settled on a figure for an optimum population level.
PLAGUE
How much land do we have? How much of it is arable? How much water do we have? How many people can this great land support in the greatest comfort.
We know that the world is over-populated. That mankind is in plague proportions. That the problems of pollution, species loss, mass starvation and pandemics are the direct result of too many people. These problems never existed in small hunter-gatherer societies.
After the Second World War when most of the current “oldies” were born, the world had a population of about 2.5 billion of which about seven million were Australian.
Now the figures are eight billion with 25 million Australians. It is almost inconceivable that this could happen in one lifetime. And it is inarguable that the current trajectory is unsustainable.
We also know that once population growth gets out of control, it is almost impossible to stop it. China’s one-child policy was designed to reduce the population so fewer people could share the available resources. It was an admirable objective but failed totally and caused untold suffering until it was disbanded.
EXODUS
It is a truism that it is quite easy to increase the population of a fertile country, it is inordinately hard to reduce it.
Hungary, a middle European country with a population of about 10 million is an interesting example of an advanced country whose population is falling.
Hungary was freshly out of communist control when it joined the EU in 2003. Higher wages and free access to neighbouring EU countries were a big attraction for Hungarian workers. When an authoritarian Fidesz Government came to power, there was an exodus of young people to Germany, Britain and Ireland seeking a better life.
The result was a chronic shortage of tradesmen in Hungary causing a huge spike in costs which is still retarding development. Other consequences of losing 450,000 young people were a sharp drop in the birth rate and an ageing population.
OPTIMUM
Because of a long history of invasion and domination by foreign powers, Hungary is too xenophobic to be attracted to mass immigration to replace the young population it has lost. Its attempts to grapple with the problems created by population reduction are proving very difficult.
It is unlikely that Australia has reached or passed its optimum population level yet, but until we know what that figure is, we are running blind.
The dominant factor in our immigration policy seems to be economic growth. Given that we have not had an economy-led recession since Paul Keating worked his economic miracle of “the recession we had to have” in the early 1990s, it seems to be working.
You can argue about the cultural, social and religious impacts of our immigration policies over the last seven decades but economically it seems to have been effective.
But here is the rub: We have become addicted to the demand created by three or four hundred thousand new arrivals in our country every year. The new homes, cars and infrastructure needed to accommodate them has become one of the main engines of our economy.
MASTER PLAN
When the Government was forced to close the doors this year due to the pandemic, it suddenly became apparent how much our industry depended on the new arrivals. More than 100,000 new homes have been built for people who are not coming. Given the thousands of different items that go into the construction of each house, this shutdown has effects reaching right through the economy.
You cannot just end immigration without disastrous effects; it is a long-term thing and if the pandemic has shown us nothing else it has shown us that.
So, if it is a long-term thing and essential to our economic health, why is there no master plan for population levels? Why have we continually failed to address the vital issue of just how many people Australia can and should support?
This is not a simple issue. It is impacted by fertility rates, ageing population, ethnic and religious issues and more, but it is absolutely essential that we have a goal.
When we have that goal, and only when we have that goal can we plan for the future.
40 MILLION
Just say the optimum level was 40 million. The current trajectory suggests we would reach that by 2050.
Therefore, we have to plan for it. We have to wean our economy off its addiction to construction by slowing down the immigration intake progressively until we reach that desired figure.
This will be no easy task. Artificial intelligence is about to wreak havoc on traditional employment practices in Australia and this will be a double whammy. But we must recognise it and plan for it.
If we do not, we will end up with a bigger population than we want or millions of displaced workers.
Our immigration policies will never make sense without a population policy.PC
Re Over-Population
Great article. I would add that global over-population is the underlying cause of many of the world’s problems – too many people chasing too few resources. This includes any real Climate Change, many territorial disputes and the forthcoming brutal competition for receding water sources.
Tax and benefit arrangements should reward small families (2 children max); certainly not large ones.
VITAL – an immigration plan with very gradual population increase so bolstering
Australia’s self-sufficiency.
VITAL – water security – an immediate start to a version of the Bradfield Scheme
financed by:-
CANCELLING – the farcical Paris Agreement, now proven impotent, based on
false, deceptive science.
CANCELLING – the criminally expensive submarine contract – a mistake of
gargantuan proportions – glibly endorsed by both sides of Govt.
Agree with the above and would put an immediate stop to polygamy as well as ending this crazy big Australia immigration policy.