Mass migration is the most influential voting topic in Australia.
This makes progressively-minded politicians uncomfortable, as it is a judgment passed on failed policy taken from global bureaucracies and implemented into domestic legislation.
Without permission.
The same individuals who drone on about social licences for nuclear power plants did not obtain one for irreversibly altering the demographic future of Australia and diluting its cultural and spiritual coherency. We can sit around and argue if this diversification is good or bad, but it does not change the fact that it was decided upon by politicians, not voters.
Australia made its borders porous. Politicians wanted a Big Australia. Leaders have a habit of measuring population size like blokes measure assets in the loo and the Australia we all love and remember made them look small.
The policy of Big Australia turned out to be a mess that wagered the future of Australian children.
In Europe, the US, and UK, this policy failure was more pronounced and severe with the addition of illegal migration from dangerous third-world regimes. The situation has become so bad that these countries have no real idea how many foreigners now reside inside their borders.
They live in absurdity, a form of progressive hell where one class in the population is arguing about what sex to put on their birth certificate while another class doesn’t even have a legal name after tearing up their documents. It is one of the many intersections of obsessive regulation and zero regulation existing in the same area. This creates a legal ‘farce’ … and I cannot think of a better description for our present reality.
Australia’s island status protects us from the majority of illegal migration. This is both a blessing and a problem for Albanese.
If the migration problem is legal, then the numbers and type of migrant arriving are entirely the government’s responsibility.
Albanese holds the keys to lock the gate.
Currently he is twirling those keys in the air, taunting the public.
The Coalition and One Nation are plotting to snatch them out of his hand.
In response, Albanese has sought to defend his position.
He attempted to do so on Sky News Australia over the weekend.
His first choice was to blame Covid.
‘The fact is that Covid happened and the borders were shut. When the borders opened after Covid, you not only had tourists coming to Australia who weren’t coming beforehand, you also had Australians coming home who were locked out.’
This is as lame as the Treasurer blaming inflation on Ukraine. Besides, the last time we checked, the migration conversation did not revolve around returning citizens or tourists.
He then went on to claim that the numbers were coming down … although crucially, his comparison cherry-picked the highest migration levels in history, not what is considered average and sustainable.
The Prime Minister added that the target remains 225,000. ‘That’s what the object is.’
That is also not what Australians say they want, which is anywhere from a five-year pause to significant negative migration to relieve cultural tensions and free up homes for Aussie kids.
They also want something done about the university sector which has been accused of operating as a profiteering backdoor to permanent residency while Australian students suffer in terms of education quality and the cost of degrees that are of little use in an over-saturated job market.
The Opposition criticised the Albanese government. Liberal Leader Angus Taylor said, ‘They’ve failed time and time again. They’ve missed every one of their targets. We’ve seen 1.4 million people coming in, in three and a half years. That’s a number we’ve never seen before, and the ongoing numbers are way above what is sustainable.’
He is not wrong, and at least Taylor is admitting that housing shortages are directly related to migration (although the Liberals continue to run the ‘increase supply’ line rather than deportations).
‘It’s no surprise that young Australians can’t get into a home, and that’s why we will establish a cap on migration.’
Taylor continued, ‘Labor cannot keep pretending that things are on the right path, particularly by citing the ridiculous statistic that they’ve brough the numbers down by around 45 per cent from the unprecedented peaks on their watch. The truth is that migration remains at levels never seen under the former Coalition government, and that these elevated levels have now been sustained for 14 straight quarters.’
The Liberal Party migration policy, as it appears under the Our Plan section on their webpage, seeks to tie migration to housing.
‘Under our plan, net overseas migration will be capped each year based on the number of new homes completed. If Australia does not build enough homes, migration will come down.’
The policy allows for migration to be ‘significantly below the cap to allow the housing market to catch up’ although it does not offer any numbers or approximations about what this target might be. Why this is left out is anyone’s guess, but presumably so the number can be adjusted to fit somewhere between Labor and One Nation as the election draws closer. This will be a hard fought-over space.
However, the Coalition does not address the central question that the Australian people have never been asked: Do we want a Big Australia?
If the answer is ‘no’, then political parties have a responsibility to tie migration to the public’s preference, not developers, universities, the Budget, or housing targets.
Labor cannot backtrack from Big Australia. Their Budget is propped up by an expanding population with little regard to quality of life. The Coalition? Well, they could, but so far their insistence on development and construction indicates a clear preference for growing cities through migration, even if it is done at a slower rate.
The government, regardless of which party is in charge, is responsible for migration.
They are not victims of open borders and they could, if they so wished, ignore UN complaints.
If Australians want change on this issue, they will have to make it known.
Flat White is written by Alexandra Marshall. If you would like to support her work, shout her a coffee over at donor-box.
