For years, KPMG partner, Bernard Salt, has been leader-in-chief for a “Big Australia”, producing reams of articles pushing rapid population growth and warning that to not follow this path would lead to a fiscal catastrophe, a weaker economy, and most importantly higher taxes. His over-riding bullishness over a Big Australia is encapsulated in the below article published on the KPMG website in February this year:
A key driver of growth, according to Salt, would be Australia’s population expansion – from the immigration of 400,000 people in 2015 compared to the long-term average of 220,000.
“This will drive the demand for household formation, infrastructure and retail. That’s good for every part of Australia,” said Salt.
“The big Australian policy, as long as its maintained, augers well for building, construction and finance,” he added, noting that around 23,000 new apartments were currently needed in downtown areas in Australia’s major cities…
Given Salt’s self-professed “position as an unabashed supporter of a bigger Australia”, it was interesting to read his comments today in The Australian warning of the immense growing pains that will be felt in Australia’s cities as their populations grow:
By 2050 some 84 per cent of the Australian nation’s 38 million residents will live in 20 cities…Do we plonk the new city on top of the existing city and tell everyone to dense-up?…
Are the new and largely idle desalination plants sufficient to deliver the water needs of an extra city entirely by 2050?…Should every capital city have two functional airports by 2050?…
If Sydney and Melbourne are gridlocked now on a Saturday morning how will they operate at seven million?…
The truth is, Australia’s living standards are on a hiding to nothing as long as our population continues to rise by 400,000 people each year, primarily on the back of our world-beating immigration program.
Let’s be honest, Australia’s politicians have failed dismally at maintaining Australia’s existing infrastructure stock, let alone expanding it by 1.5% to 2% each year to cope with the added population. Accordingly, the march towards a Big Australia is providing dis-economies of scale, choking the nation’s productivity in the process.
Hopefully, Salt has finally seen the light on the folly of Australia’s high immigration program, although I doubt it.
