Immigration

The Australian Bureau of Statistics’ (ABS) attempted censorship of the migration debate, explained in detail here and here, received support from ABC’s Media Watch, which attacked so-called ‘right-wing’ media outlets for raising alarm at the astronomical numbers of net migrants landing in Australia, which are higher than anything Australia experienced before the pandemic.

A key reason for the decline in Australia’s productivity and living standards is that the country has grown rapidly through mass immigration. World Bank data presented below shows that Australia’s population increased by 45% (circa 8.5 million) in the first 25 years of this century, the strongest growth in the advanced world.

Recently, the issue of how migration is measured has exploded into the headlines, with several media outlets and other organisations, including 2GB, the Daily Mail, the Institute of Public Affairs and Macrobusiness, receiving correspondence from the ABS on the issue.

There are two key migration data sets published by the ABS. These are regularly utilised by analysts, the media, and the government. There is the official quarterly net overseas migration (NOM) data, which is published on a six- to nine-month delay.

James Campbell from the Daily Telegraph reported on the explosion in bogus asylum seekers under the Albanese government: When Labor came to office, there were roughly 68,000 people who had been told they must leave who were still here.

One of the main purposes of migration is to raise productivity.

On Wednesday evening, I received an email from an Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) media officer suggesting that I have misled the public by quoting the ABS’ monthly net permanent and long-term arrivals data.

Recent data from Jobs & Skills Australia (JSA), published in The Australian, showed that there were an abundance of applicants per job, suggesting that concerns around labour shortages are overblown.

The solution to the rental crisis is being played out across Australia’s two most similar nations: Canada and New Zealand.

Earlier this year, Matt Bell of The Australian wrote an article based on the Hays 2025 Skills Report, saying that Australia was experiencing a skills crisis, with businesses struggling to recruit staff with the necessary abilities.

According to a 2022 survey conducted by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Indian migrants much prefer Labor to the Coalition.

Amidst the ongoing debate over the right level of migration into Australia, there have been attempts to dismiss the impact of high migration on housing, with one notable example coming from SBS, which provided readers with a guide on how to counter arguments from Australians concerned about the issue.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) claims that international education is Australia’s fourth largest export, earning the country $51 billion in 2023–24.

Over the last year in particular, the impact of international students on the nation’s rental market has sparked significant controversy.

Australia currently has the highest share of temporary migrants and international students as a percentage of our population in the advanced world. The latest temporary visa data from the Department of Home Affairs shows that there were a record 2,460,000 temporary migrants in Australia (excluding visitors) in Q2 2025.

In the lead-up to the 2022 federal election, Labor promised to run a smaller immigration policy if elected.

The Albanese government cannot be trusted on immigration.

The latest data from the Departments of Home Affairs and Education indicates that the Albanese government’s “crackdown” on the international education sector has had minimal impact.

The latest temporary visa data for Q2 2025 from the Department of Home Affairs shows that the total number of student visas on issue in Australia fell marginally to 592,342, down from 608,262 a year prior.

Canada experienced a boom in temporary migrants over recent years, which helped drive up rental inflation to astonishing levels.

Tarric Brooker posted the following chart on Twitter (X) showing that the level of real Australian resource exports per capita has risen from around $3,500 per year in 1988 to just under $15,000 per year currently.

In the years since the pandemic, Canada has run one of the largest migration programs in the world in per capita terms, with its level of population growth rising to almost 3% in 2024, according to figures from the World Bank.

Neither policymakers nor proponents of a Big Australia accept the importance of water in the immigration debate.