Following in the wake of Mark Latham’s, Dick Smith’s, Bob Carr’s, and Judith Sloan’s recent calls to cut immigration to take the pressure off housing and infrastructure, and to improve housing affordability, Tony Walker – a Vice-Chancellor’s Fellow at La Trobe University – has now entered the fray. From The Canberra Times:
…arguments for a “big populate or perish Australia” – based on a belief in the contribution of raw population numbers to economic growth – hold sway.
Discussion about optimum immigration tends to get sidetracked by concerns those advocating a review of the net overseas migration (NOM) intake – plus student arrivals as a proxy for individuals seeking permanent residence – have ulterior, racially tinged motives.
Let’s put aside those unfortunate constraints on an open discussion and ask a simple question: what remedies might be considered to ease pressures on the housing market in the larger cities and on Sydney and Melbourne’s overburdened infrastructure?
This is a conversation the country needs to have with itself beyond the various Productivity Commission reports that nibble at the edges of the issue, and intergenerational reports that have tended to misfire.
These IGRs have been overwhelmed by shifting demographics. For example, back in 2002 the Australian Bureau of Statistics was forecasting a population of 26.4 million by 2051 from numbers then of 19.7 million.
We are within less than 10 per cent of that figure now, with our population rapidly approaching 24.5 million…
Last week, the ABS reported that greater Sydney’s population had topped 5 million, compared with greater Melbourne’s 4.64 million. At present rates of increase, Melbourne will overtake Sydney by mid-century when both will have populations above 8 million.
In 2002, the ABS was forecasting populations for Sydney and Melbourne respectively by 2051 of 5.6 million and 4.7 million.
Against this background and given planning snafus by NSW and Victoria too numerous to mention but including successive Victorian governments’ failure to plan adequately for a bulging population to Melbourne’s west, the time would seem to have arrived for a searching discussion about optimum population distribution. That includes the sacred cow of net overseas migration.
It seems commonsense is not so common amongst our political class. Blind Freddy can see that shoving 80,000 to 100,000-plus people into Sydney and Melbourne each year is going to cause massive indigestion, choking infrastructure and making housing both smaller and more expensive.
Since John Howard initially opened the immigration floodgates in 2003, Australia’s population has grown at nearly 2.5 times the OECD average:
The majority of these migrants have poured into the already congested major cities. In the 2015-16 financial year, Melbourne added an insane 108,000 people, whereas Sydney added 83,000:
And over the past 12 years, Melbourne added a ridiculous 1 million people (a 27% increase), whereas Sydney added 821,000 people (a 20% increase):
Because of mass immigration, Sydney’s population is projected to grow by 87,000 people per year (1,650 people each week) to 6.4 million over the next 20-years – effectively adding another Perth to the city’s population:
Whereas Melbourne’s population is projected to balloon by 97,000 people per year (1,870 people each week) over the next 35 years to more than 8 million people:
Despite these irrefutable facts, the Turnbull Government continues to pin the blame for Sydney’s and Melbourne’s housing crisis on dwelling supply not keeping up with demand – completely ignoring mass immigration’s preeminent role in the matter.
Bill Shorten, meanwhile, has played the ‘race card’ and labelled anyone arguing to cut immigration a “political extremist”.
For their part, The Greens – who are supposed to care for the environment – won’t entertain cuts to immigration and instead want to massively boost the humanitarian intake by 50,000 people a year, thus increasing Australia’s immigration intake even further.
The fact remains that it is a direct policy choice how ‘big’ Australia becomes, not a fait accompli.
As shown in the next chart, which comes from the Productivity Commission, Australia’s population will reach more than 40 million mid-century under current immigration settings, at least 13 million more than would occur under zero net overseas migration (NOM):
That’s a helluva lot of extra people to build infrastructure and housing for versus a lower or zero NOM policy.
Instead of hand-wringing over Australia’s housing crisis and inadequate infrastructure investment, how about politicians, policy makers and the media instead question Australia’s mass immigration settings, which are the demand-driver causing the problems in the first place? Why not argue to reduce immigration to sensible and sustainable levels?
Sadly, only the Sustainable Australia party has our interests at heart and is fighting the good fight on this matter.
