It is little wonder that Michael is a former members of the Greens. Michael is no orphan in that regard - like Michael I joined the Greens only to be rapidly disillusioned and am now a former member. The Greens are in many ways no different to the major parties all fly a particular ideological flag of convenience be it capitalism, socialism or, in the case of the Greens, environmentalism but there is as much difference between these various brands as there is between different brands of toothpaste.

Population is like the weather. Everyone talks about it but nobody does anything about it. Nor will anyone do anything about it, for Michael needs to refresh his memory about some recent history. Back in the 1980s and early 1990s there was some talk about limiting immigration, with the main driver being increasing housing prices. The government agreed that quots should be limited. Quotas went up. Why? My memory of it is that the govt couldn't get anything through the Senate controlled by the Democrats. At the time quotas were perhaps half of what they are now. Okay, so why do the quotas keep on increasing? Maybe Michael could chuck away the lectures on green policy and concentrate on working out why quotas keep on increasing. Then he might be able to work out a way to short circuit that process.

A very good article although it beats a dead horse in the 2nd half.

Without defending the Greens too much it is important to understand that in order to get a significant percentage of votes the Greens need to appeal to a broad cross section of the population.

I'm reminded of one of the opening scenes of the 70's movie "The Candidate." Robert Redford plays an idealistic lawyer that a major party wants to challenge for the US Senate. Redford's character demands that he be guaranteed that he can continue his idealistic ideas through the campaign. The hard bitten campaign manager says "I'll give you a guarantee" and hands him a slip of paper that says "YOU LOSE."

It takes a lot of people to run a political party. That means moving toward the values of your members on lots of issues. I agree with Michael's assessment that as Labor has moved right, a lot of the disgruntled left have moved to the Greens. That means that some of their policies have taken on a more "social justice" character as Michael points out.

The Greens probably figure they aren't going to lose any votes by having a soft population policy and they might lose some votes with a more definitive (and in my view better for Australia) policy like the Stable Population Party or the Stop Population Growth Now party. If people vote for the population parties, the Greens will probably get the preferences over labor and liberal anyway. Saying that the greens are as conniving as the Labor and Liberal isn't news. It is the way that they have to be, to compete on the big stage.

It is easy for Michael to sit around and say that the Greens are more like the old Labor left. That's true but it isn't going to make any progress in the tough world of Australian politics.

Despite all that, the Greens are still miles better on environmental issues than either major party and if they hold the balance of power, the environment will be better protected than if they don't.

Interesting article on how the Greens have 'lost the plot'.

In their book 'Overloading Australia',Mark O'connor and William Lines claim that the Greens, and other environmental organizations have been influenced more by misguided PC than sound environmental policy. Michael Lardelli's analysis of the Greens' manifesto (and his personal experience) seem to support their assessment.

High population growth is surely a major factor in Australia's environmental problems(and it has an obvious solution )any 'environmental' organization that doesn't acknowledge this is not worthy of the name.

Can't trust the greens with anything, they put themselves out as an enviromental party when communist party is a much more accurate term.

and as for labor

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41VJISBGi9E

Meh. Michael's apparently an activist who joined the Greens under the misapprehension that they're primarily an environmental party who would promote his population hobbyhorse. However, the Greens have four equally important philosophical 'pillars', namely

* Ecological sustainability
* Social justice
* Participatory democracy
* Peace and nonviolence

As a member of the Greens for some time now, I've seen plenty of people come and go after realising that the Greens aren't there as a platform for their particular obsession. Having said that, I'd like the Greens to formulate a stronger population policy - but the way to achieve that is to participate in the policy process, rather than taking one's bat and ball and slagging from the sidelines.

Any population policy formulated by the Greens has to take into account all four of their philosophical pillars. Unfortunately that's not enough for some people who view population in unidimensional terms.

CJ Morgan would do well to follow this link http://www.opendemocracy.net/paul-kingsnorth/confessions-of-recovering-environmentalist?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzEmail&utm_content=201210&utm_campaign=On-Demand_2010-08-16%2013:27
The point that Michael is making that without a strong population policy the very first plank of the Greens platform is negated.
Population is not just a hobby horse - without a population policy you cannot claim any environmental credentials. My experience with the Greens has been that there are many outstanding environmentalists in the movement but the policy making process is dominated by cafe latte environmentalists who want to do something about the environment as long as it does not demand that they surrender 21st century consumerism.
It is equally clear that there is by no means a shared understanding within the greens of what they mean by the other 3 principles that CJ Morgan identified - participatory democracy in the Greens does not extend to the members having any influence over the policies adopted by the parliamentary wing - indeed the members are little more than a cheer squad for the elected members. The commitment to Social Justice does not seem to extend to demanding that Australia end its policy of recruiting skilled labour from the developing world making it even more difficult for the developing world to lift itself out of poverty.
It is time that members of the Greens indulged in some brain pain when developing their policies - perhaps this final article will convince the Greens that as it stands they are a long way from being an environmental party http://www.postcarbon.org/Reader/PCReader-Ryerson-Population.pdf

Great article Michael.

I am another disillusioned former Greens member.

But hey, maybe they can redeem themselves. On Q&A last week after Dick Smith’s Population Puzzle docco, Bob Brown nearly knocked my socks off with his comments about population growth. He was actually saying the right sort of stuff…. for the first time ever in my experience!

Now that the ‘dam holding back the population debate has burst and a flood of concern has swept out over the nation’, perhaps the Greens will really grab hold of the population / sustainability issue. Heaven knows they’ll need to, because our new government is bound to be woeful on it.

I reckon they'd glean a great deal of support if they did. But….I’ll believe it when I see it!

If CJ Morgan represents the leadership or the general consensus in the Greens then I have erred in my previous post assuming that the Greens were simply hard-headed political realists.

If the leadership of the Greens thinks that population is a hobbyhorse rather than the vital link to getting sustainable, then they need to change their name to the Social Justice party and quit masquerading as an environmental party. It is hard to believe that is the case after hearing Bob Brown after the Dick Smith movie, but maybe. We will have to see.

Perhaps there just aren't enough people who are really interested in the environment to fill up a "sort of" major party. The Greens have to take who they get and who they got, ain't really Green.

This is a blow to the sustainable population movement. The pro-growthers can easily say "What are you complaining about all the time? Even the Greens don't think population is important."

Maybe we can work with the Greens to understand what they really think. I hope so. Not much chance of working with Liberal or Labor.

YES - YES - YES.

Yes we can trust the Greens, all the way on population?

Didn't you see Bob Browns statements on Q & A Population Debate. Among his statements he said, "we've concentrated ridiculously on one or two per cent of the immigrants to this country who come as refugees on boats. We've got to raise the level of the debate. We're a compassionate country. "

http://www.abc.net.au/tv/qanda/txt/s2981403.htm

Here's the Dick Smith questions. He did well to break the ice on this debate.

http://www.abc.net.au/tv/populationpuzzle/index.html

Let's Hope we can put the best side of our brain forward Australia.

In Canberra, any bozo, doofus dingbat who says the Greens won't stand up to the ALP in the senate doesn't understand the progressive topic's being challenged in this local [and may I say] "healthy" electorate.

ACT Greens candidate Lin Hatfield Dodds is rimstone, hot and mighty. We want her in. Gai Brodtmann from the ALP is both applied, intelligent and comes with business savvy economic community driven experience. More then tennis in the field here.

Given the chance, the Greens will take over where the Democrats left off. "Keep the B's Honest".

As an example of how politics ought to be; I wish Cape Yorkers and my friends in Leichhardt were here to see it. Local politics in Canberra is hot, inclusive and it is politics at it's best.

So what was the question?

http://www.miacat.com/

<< The Greens have to take who they get and who they got, ain't really Green. >>

Erm…yes, that’s about the size of it, ericc.

I want to be positive, but alas, I can’t see the Greens being much different to what they always have been on this issue. Let’s face it; they’d have to become very different if they were to start expressing concerns about population and sustainability with anything like the level of urgency that is needed.

They now have the most excellent opportunity to become Australia’s sustainability party and to do it with a level of support much greater than what they have ever had, in fact to the extent of becoming a third major party, I would think.

But with Bob Brown at the helm and with an apparent preponderance of pale green social-justice-oriented members, I’ll believe it when I see it. (:>/

I think that much of the disillusionment of population activists with the Greens derives from their uninformed assumption that environmental issues are paramount to the party. The simple fact is that, while the Greens rightly accord ecological sustainability far more importance than the major parties do, they have never pretended that it is their raison d'etre. Social justice, participatory democracy and nonviolence have always held equal weight in Green ideology, at least since the Australian Greens were formed in the 1990s as part of the global Greens movement.

Having said that, I agree with ericc that "the Greens are still miles better on environmental issues than either major party and if they hold the balance of power, the environment will be better protected than if they don't". However, I don't think that the Greens are, or want to be, an "environmental party" of the sort that BAYGON apparently envisages. Unlike purely environmental political groups, the Greens have developed a comprehensive set of policies that reflect the equal importance of their four philosophical pillars, which is of course a major reason that they have been steadily increasing their membership and support base over the past couple of decades.

While I'm neither a spokesperson nor any kind of 'leader' in the Greens, as a grassroots member who has been involved in policy formulation and is familiar with Green philosophy, I can say that our policies reflect the consensus view of the party - indeed, that's how the Greens work. Unfortunately, many good and passionate activists for one worthy cause or another join the Greens thinking that they're something that they're not, nor pretend to be.

I'm certainly hopeful that the Greens will strengthen our population policy along the lines that Bob Brown was talking about on last week's Q&A. However, the way to achieve that as a Greens member is to get involved with policy working groups and being delegated to State and National Councils where these things are nutted out, rather than spitting one's dummy and stomping out of the room, as it were.

Let's say I am way less than impressed about the need to offset our skilled migration intake on behalf of refugees, or stances of some members on population-crowding in urban areas as a necessary sacrifice for compassion.

There are no working class people in the Greens leadership and precious few in the rank and file, if there were we'd see a different party.

If we just slammed the door shut to migrants tomorrow and cut the baby bonus we're still headed for around the 30 million mark so all of these passionate arguments pro and con are redundant.
There's no room for party politics in environmentalism, it has to be revolutionary, the Elites have to be removed and change implemented.
If White countries fall over and can't keep feeding the Africans and West Asians then the death toll, wars and global instability will make the 20th century look like a picnic.
When I post views opposing the ongoing genocide of White people it's not a totally selfish response, what if we can't export food in the future?
If White people fall below a certain population level the suffering among the other races will be cataclysmic.
Think about that for a while.

Jay of Melbourne lots wrong with your post and lots wrong with what I assume are your general ideas about the world. There are no "White" countries. The USA is not a "white" country and Australia is not a "White" country. Lots of different people with different coloured skin do lots of different jobs to keep Australia and the USA and most of Europe going. Those countries export a lot of food and people with all kinds of coloured skin do the work that makes that happen.

Nobody "feeds" Africans and West Asians. They grow their own food and pay for the food that they import with good money that they earn in other ways. Often by growing other kinds of food. If they can't pay, they starve and that is happening abundantly in Africa and all over Asia.

There is no ongoing genocide of white people.

The implication that only white people can do the work that grows and exports food is wrong. India, Pakistan and Thailand all export more rice than the USA. Many African countries export food. If the countries that export a lot of food like Austalia were unable to export as much food, it would be bad for all kinds of people of all different colours.

Ericc.
"Everybody says there is this RACE problem. Everybody says this RACE problem will be solved when the third world pours into EVERY white country and ONLY into white countries."

"The Netherlands and Belgium are more crowded than Japan or Taiwan, but nobody says Japan or Taiwan will solve this RACE problem by bringing in millions of third worlders and quote assimilating unquote with them."

"Everybody says the final solution to this RACE problem is for EVERY white country and ONLY white countries to "assimilate," i.e., intermarry, with all those non-whites."

"What if I said there was this RACE problem and this RACE problem would be solved only if hundreds of millions of non-blacks were brought into EVERY black country and ONLY into black countries?"

"How long would it take anyone to realize I'm not talking about a RACE problem. I am talking about the final solution to the BLACK problem?"

"And how long would it take any sane black man to notice this and what kind of psycho black man wouldn't object to this?"

"But if I tell that obvious truth about the ongoing program of genocide against my race, the white race, Liberals and respectable conservatives agree that I am a naziwhowantstokillsixmillionjews."

"They say they are anti-racist. What they are is anti-white."

"Anti-racist is a code word for anti-white."

What would happen if you swapped the populations of Finland and Kenya, put a big fence around both, and had another look after a few hundred thousand years or so? I suspect that you might discover a population of light skinned people living in Finland and a population of dark skinned people living in Kenya.

Jay - The Race problem that I am more familiar with is that some people don't want to give other people a fair go because of the colour of their skin.

Everybody deserves a fair go and people should judge other people by their actions not by the colour of their skin.

I don't think anything in your 929 post is correct.

Ericc, you can disagree with my post but you can't argue against it, it's Iron clad.
The greatest environmental catastrophe will occur if the White countries are degraded to the point that the good will of White people toward the Third World dries up or we simply can't provide the assistance the third world is accustomed to.

Nothing is invented in the third world anymore, little is manufactured from indigenous technologies and the most serious environmental damage (deforestation for example) is being perpetrated by third worlders.
You have to face facts, Africans are not going to become environmentalists, skilled migrants and refugees are going to side with their benefactors, the polluting Oligarchs,their owned political class and the god of Western consumerism. If climate change is to be ameliorated then WHITE people and to a lesser extent Asians are going to be the driving force behind change.
The Green movement cannot be taken seriously while it focuses in Anti Racism and homosexual "Rights", neither of which have anything to do with the environment.
Believe me, coming from a White nationalist background I can recognise "blocking" issues when I see them.
We have the "Jewish" question and "Who's White?" which are always held up as reasons not to proceed, Anti Racism and Homosexual rights are their Leftist analogue, they eat up precious time and resources and divert energy from the real issues.
The Green movement is now in the pocket of big money, it works to the government agenda.
Take my earlier post to heart, the only way you will achieve change is to get rid of the source of the problem through revolution.
If the environment is the most important issue at hand then why in God's name are you all sitting around waiting for PERMISSION to act from the people at the root of the problem?
A ragtag bunch of little brown men can best a Western power any day of the week but White people can't even talk about revolution without someone wetting their pants and going crying to the Feds.
Greenies aren't serious otherwise they'd be DOING something.

JoM “I wonder how you'd respond the the idea that "Multiculturalism" was designed to fail in order to bring about Racial assimilation?”

Not sure what you are suggest JoM but ultimately, “assimilation” will prevail because for “multiculturalism” to be “sustained” would mean its proponents would demand people of different culture would retain their “ethnic purity” by not intermarrying (intermarriage being the primary path for “assimilation”) and any ethnic minority which thinks that is a sustainable prognosis is seriously deluding itself to the point of extinction and I say that as an Anglo-Saxon, recalling that to be an “Anglo-Saxon means you are part “Angle, part Saxon and probably a bit of ancient Briton, some Celtic and of course mixed with bits of Roman, Norman, Gaelic Viking… oh do I need to go on?

Designed or not, multiculturalism will fail because it contains the seeds of its own destruction within the abnormal and abhorrent philosophy, which thinks it could possibly work but then, so many theories of collectivism harbor similar failngs and this is just another one, that it should be no surprise to anyone.
Whilst I doubt there is great difference between our views, I personally, see no merit in diluting the quality of our legal tradition by abdicating anything to Sharia law or the barbaric practices of a medieval religious-feudalism.
I always assumed among the multiplicity of reasons motivating Muslims migrating to a Christian country was to adopt the practices of that Christian country, as is demanded (in reverse) by Christians who may wish to migrate to any number of Muslim countries (the Seychelles to name but one)

Ah Johnny Rotten seems to think he has the right to be obnoxious to everyone … I am adopting a new policy for response to the likes of him

Susieonline different eating habits and food shops etc. is not a hallmark or valid claim of evidence of “multiculturalism”. Such things have been common in many countries in which the operators of such establishments have fully assimilated into the host nation before “multiculturalism” was invented.

Can we trust “Greens” on sustainability or on any other matter, at all?

The environmental movement was infiltrated by Trotskyites and other leftwing extremists back in the early 1990’s and before, even before the USSR and its Empire of Evil started to collapse.

Doubtless, the offensive collectivist politics which embrace lies, deception, revolution and violence are the seed-stock of every exaggeration, misrepresentation and collectivist "restrictive" / "levelling" policy, initiated in the name of “green activism”.

The environmental movement is a “Trojan horse” of leftwing extremists and their gullible helpers, the “useful idiots” as Lenin called them.

It has been said that in Tasmanian politics, an allegiance between a mainstream party and minority greens is a “poison chalice”.

Trust a Green like you would a rabid dog and maybe adopt the same survival policy, forget any “allegiance” and just shoot the dog before it has the opportunity to bite, not after.

In reply to C J Morgan.

You say:

"...., the Greens have four equally important philosophical 'pillars', namely

* Ecological sustainability
* Social justice
* Participatory democracy
* Peace and nonviolence

As a member of the Greens ....Any population policy formulated by the Greens has to take into account all four of their philosophical pillars. Unfortunately that's not enough for some people who view population in unidimensional terms."

As a one time Green supporter, Let me say what I see the issue as being: The Greens cannot have an honest and realistic Policy of "Ecological sustainability" which so obviously excludes references to population growth and population issues. Neither will they achieve the other policy issue goals unless they face up to population questions.

My problem is that the Green party, and its leader, do not have any integrity on the population issue. They will not address it frankly and honestly. I do not expect integrity from the major parties, but I do expect it from the Greens. Unfair I know. So perhaps in this sense I am being unidimensional.

Hi there last word. Unsurprisingly, I disagree with you about the integrity of the Greens. Greens policy development, like all decison-making processes within the Greens, works on a consensus model. Ergo, unless advocates of a particular policy position can persuade the great majority of other Greens as to its virtues, it doesn't get up. With respect to population policy, clearly there is no consensus in the party with respect to the kinds of measures you and others desire.

The Greens' adherence to their consensus model of participatory democracy is indicative of their integrity. Indeed, to have joined the Laberals in their poll-driven 'race to the bottom' approach to population issues would indicate a lack of integrity on the part of the Greens, similar to that which we expect from the Laberals.

Not that they ignore population policy entirely. The current version is available here

http://greens.org.au/policies/environment/population

As I've said before, as a Greens member I'd like to see this policy strengthened substantially - but the way to do that is to engage in the policy process rather than taking my bat and ball and sledging from the sidelines.

@C J Morgan
This thread started as a response to Michael's analysis of the flaws in the Greens population policy to respond by simply referring us back to the Green's policy is essentially stating that you agree with his analysis.
As far as the consensus model of democracy goes then your description of what happened is an even greater indictment on the Greens.
Indeed implicit in your analysis of the reasons why the policy is constructed the way it is is an assumption that it is just a "race to the bottom" The problem here is that the Greens allowed the Laberals to hijack the debate by allowing them to focus just on 'boat people' - refugees are not central to the population debate - the real problem with our population growth lies with policies that encourage migration . The fact that the Greens had no one in the party capable of joining the dots and demonstrating that without a robust population policy their environmental credentials are in tatters suggests that the majority of the Greens who participate in these policy discussions clearly have no understanding of what is meant by sustainable. (Remember that is one of your four pillars)

Michael L,
What you say about the Greens is all true. there is a truth in the business world that in order to get to a cerain destination you really want, you can't just jump straight there. you have to put all your energies into 'irrelevant' steps one and two and three before final step four. That's where the greens are.

You will recall Bob Brown's remarks in Dick Smith's population presentation that he wanted all of us in the general population to demand loudly that we want a stable population. Then he can act.

So, you are a actually a very good green supporter. (grin)
Cheers

I too have found difficulty with the innocuous population policy of the Greens. However this is not an unusual position of many environment focussed organisations over the years. The Nature Conservation Council of NSW has torn its hair a number of times, I don't know that anything has changed lately not being involved for a while. The Australian Conservation Foundation has slowly come to the conclusion that Population is a major consideration and their policy is now much more direct than it has ever been before but it had been contentious and the policy innocuous in the past. The Democrats policy under John Coulter was strong. I remember some real political stuff happening within the Greens at one time over a stronger population policy though I don't know the details. I had a conversation once with Lee Rhiannon many years ago which she would be unlikely to remember and it was clear that she was not interested in talking numbers at all. I am now a member of the Greens and believe the ACF policy is the right way to go and hope to argue that in Green forums in the future.

Bob Brown is an under achiever who believes he can get respect only by immigrating another 50 or 60 million people because he can't get respect from the 23 million that are already here.

Bob Brown is a fraud and he doesn't give a damn about the Australian continent or its fading natural bounty. He's in it for the money and the fame.

It was so obvious on the Dick Smith debate when Ted Shepherd from the Transfield engineering monopoly dressed him down and Brown looked so scared that he couldn't even defend himself.

Shepherd was just ranting the Labor oligarchist line that all the big Anglo business & political groups should have LESS competition while the general population should have MORE competition from highly skilled migrants so the WEAK 90% or so of the current population can be weedeed out thus fulfilling LABOR's bigger,better NATION BUILDING dream.

My view was that Brown has the same idea and agenda. His inability to respond to Shepherd was because he COULDN'T agree with Shepherd while he was trying to sneakily grab votes in a population control forum. It was written all over his face!

The Next election, people casting protest votes against Labor's anglo genocide immigration policy, especially places like Qld and Western Sydney, must vote directly for the sustainable population parties with no Labor preferences & NOT the Greens. I believe within 3 months the Greens and the traiterous Labor's presence in Parliament will be gone if this occurs.

Australian's are tired of being soft Genocided by selfish Labor, anglo kings and queens who Nation Build by immigrating .5 million a year thankful migrants, who have the skills to compete ordinary neglected Australians onto the trash heap of life and die, so they can never again threaten Labor's ascendancy by their "democratic" right of protest voting.

The next election may be the last chance for neglected Australians. For if Labor wins again its fury at their current embarrassment will be assuaged by increasing its immigration program sky-high, with ever more criminal groups & toxic polluters favoured elements.

In response to CJ Morgan, 21/08/10:

<< I think that much of the disillusionment of population activists with the Greens derives from their uninformed assumption that environmental issues are paramount to the party. >>

Yes. Many would have thought in the early days of the Australian Greens that environmental issues would be paramount, especially given that the party arose within the worldwide green (environmental) movement of the time.

In fact, their very name strongly implies if not implicitly states, that the party is based on environmental philosophies and that social justice issues and all else are of secondary and tertiary importance.

Anyway, even if environmentalism wasn’t at the top of the agenda, it was still a big part of it and there could just be no excuse for the Greens being so dismal for so long on population and sustainability issues.

<< I'm certainly hopeful that the Greens will strengthen our population policy along the lines that Bob Brown was talking about on last week's Q&A. >>

Absolutely. Now that Bob has fiiiinally come out in strong support of a sensible population policy, the Greens surely have to modify their policy and undertake a line of action in accordance with his comments. That will be wonderful when it happens…um…..if it happens!

<< However, the way to achieve that as a Greens member is to get involved with policy working groups …., rather than spitting one's dummy and stomping out of the room, as it were. >>

Yes, for Greens members. And for non-Greens like me to keep on at them about it. I rightly left the Greens in 1996 because their actions on population, the continuous growth paradigm and sustainability were virtually non-existent.

I remember speaking to Bob on one occasion when he visited Townsville and asking him about population growth. He answered in a very cursory manner, without making eye contact and basically dismissed the issue as of no consequence.

So, here’s hoping that he has genuinely seen the light and that the Greens will now effectively become our sustainability party and strive to keep the antisustainability bastards honest!

@ Cj Morgan

<< However, the way to achieve that as a Greens member is to get involved with policy working groups …., rather than spitting one's dummy and stomping out of the room, as it were. >>

And this is where the problem lies. Michael Lardelli was a member of the policy working party that developed a sound population policy.
The situation at that time was this - the Greens established a number of policy working parties. The people on these working parties were generally there because they had an interest or expertise with regard to the question at hand. I am sure Michael's working party was no different to mine - we spent many long hours coming up with a succinct policy statement.
However, when we saw the version of the policy statement that was presented to the membership we discovered it had been pared/edited down ostensibly for reasons of length. Yet in the editing process the original logic of the policy (at least in the case of population and the one's in which I was involved) had been lost.
The policies that the membership was encouraged to vote on were sold as being the product of the work that a dedicated and informed group had undertaken and so was generally adopted without dissent.
I know that at least 3 policies did not reflect the consensus achieved in the working party but few of the members would be aware of that.
In the light of such blatant manipulation of participatory democracy what choice does one have but to leave such a party? It is not a dummy spit but rather an attempt to maintain one's integrity.

Dear Baygon,

What the Greens leadership did to Lardelli's report sounds similar to what the Vatican has done with various reports they have commissioned if the Curia doesn't like the results.

BAYGON - the fact that a small working group presents a policy proposal on which they have reached consensus doesn't mean that it's going to be accepted in its entirety by a consensus of delegates to State and National Councils, which are the actual decision-making bodies of the Greens. Delegates to these bodies are selected and entrusted by grassroots branch members to represent their views, and clearly the examples you cite were insufficiently supported by delegates on that basis.

You're of course entitled to pursue your own personal population policy agenda, but you'd have much more chance of the Greens accommodating aspects of it in policy if you were a current member, rather than a former member pissing the product of sour grapes into the tent from outside.

david f - I'd have thought you'd have learnt a little more by now about Greens internal processes. There is no inner cabal of 'leaders' who dictate policy, unlike other political parties in Australia, and certainly the polar opposite of how I imagine the Vatican works.

CJ thanks for responding to all these comments. I must admit that I feel some sympathy for the guys not wanting to continue beating their heads against the wall if there has been no support for population stabilisation within the Greens members.

A few things that the Greens might consider on the social justice platform, with respect to immigration and population.

1) There are about 5 billion people living in countries with GDP per capita less than one tenth of Australia's. I bet almost all of them would like to immigrate to Australia. If Australia took in 1%, that would be 50 million people. It would make no difference to world poverty and completely stuff Australia.

2) The people from those poor countries that do get a chance to immigrate to Australia are the skilled and upper middle class of those countries. Those are the people who would be best able to build those countries, but they are also the best people to fill the skill gaps (or keep labour costs low) in Australia. The business community brags that this is really good business. "We let somebody else pay to train our workforce and then we use them to make profits. This is an opportunity that we can't pass up." That does not seem to meet the Greens social justice pillar in any way.

3) The same is true of boat people. The poorest people can’t afford people smugglers. The truly poor have to make due in refugee camps that they can walk to. Why are boat people more deserving of a chance in Australia than a family in a refugee camp?

continued . . . .

4) As long as Australia is intent on increasing its population there is little moral authority to recommend that poor countries stabilise their populations. It is great for Bob Brown to say that he will push for Australia to increase its overseas aid budget to 0.7% of GDP, but what will the money be used for. If anybody says women’s health clinics or education for women in poor countries, the third world response will be “You just want us to limit our population while you increase your population.” If Australia was stabilising our own population we could show that countries can be happy, successful and prosperous with stable populations.

Good Luck CJ. I hope the Greens can get a solid population policy.

CJ Morgan wrote: david f - I'd have thought you'd have learnt a little more by now about Greens internal processes. There is no inner cabal of 'leaders' who dictate policy, unlike other political parties in Australia, and certainly the polar opposite of how I imagine the Vatican works.

Dear CJ,

I am privy to neither the the leadership interaction of the Greens nor to the mechanisms by which the Curia operate. I don't know how I would learn about either except by hearing the accounts of others. However, they are both political organisations and as such I assume they have some interactions in common.

I now realise that all these discussions on population, global warming
etc etc are now becoming irrelevant.
Populations will decline as food becomes more expensive and scarce,
global warming will lose relevance as energy declines and people will
be more interested in getting a good meal than a tank full of petrol or
ethanol.

I have just watched the four independents on Press Club.
Only Bob Katter made any reference to fuel supply but even he could not
bring himself to use the words "Peak Oil".
Surely, as energy declines, everything else will decline along side it.
Just compare the population curve with oil consumption for the last
140 years and you will be stunned by the match.

We are entering a period of peak everything, including peak population.

@Bazz
I suspect you are right - and most of us who are concerned with population would share your outlook. If you recall the population graph that Dick Smith had on his population puzzle you would remember that he showed a sharp rise in population growth from the beginning of the 19th century to the present.
Biologists have observed that when a species reaches plague proportions you can plot its population growth on a similar graph, furthermore the 'spike' tends to be symmetrical - so we can expect the global population to decline at much the same rate and over the same time span as it took to reach its peak.
So why bother? If we allow nature to take its course then I think the outcome would be far more unpleasant then if we were to take steps ourselves to introduce policies that discourage population growth.
I am not advocating coercion but rather incentives not to have children.

C J Morgan, "There is no inner cabal of 'leaders' who dictate policy, unlike other political parties in Australia, and certainly the polar opposite of how I imagine the Vatican works."

That is all cobblers for sure and you know it. Bob Brown thought nothing of walking over the newly elected Greens member of the House of Representatives Adam Bandt, to second guess and deny Bandt's stated intention to support Labor. Did Brown even talk with Bandt first? There is no evidence that he did. Second, Bob Brown has said he has entered into negotiations (not deals he says) with the LNP, but Adam Bandt is no-where in the picture. Obviously to Brown, Bandt is no more than a puppet and an excuse to beard Gillard and Abbott in the lower house.

Of course Bob Brown acts like the Pope, but he is cunning enough to present the image of a democratic leadership (Uncle Bob) so the Greens and he himself are difficult to pin down on policy and decisions. It is all part of those Green 'tactics' you have often muttered darkly about. However most would see such behaviour as misleading and unethical. No wonder Brown was kept out of the recent Greens' election campaign and now partnership in government in Tasmania. The Tassie voters want 'green' as in environmental considerations in policy, not green as in convenient camouflage for radical social policy without mandate.

Federally, it is because the major parties are pre-occupied with opposing each other that the Greens can get away with an ambiguously worded, conflicting but likely radical social policy. As you have previously insinuated but now boldly assert, the mainland Greens are far more interested in their social agenda - the green militancy is all for show.

As far as population is concerned, the Greens' first priority of promoting and extending 'diversity' easily trumps sustainability, which is why Bob Brown only shadow-boxes at (over-)population and sustainability, while wanting to keep the immigration spigot turned wide open.

Cornflower, we know that you hate the Greens, but you really should stop just making things up.

You know nothing about the Greens' decison-making processes or structure. While Bob Brown is the parliamentary leader, he is not the leader of the party - indeed, the Greens don't have one as such. Tactical parliamentary negotiations are quite different to substantive policy development processes, and in any case Greens parliamentarians are answerable to the State and National Councils of the party.

As it happens, Adam Bandt has reiterated his intention to support an ALP government, so your premise is shown to be the bunkum that it is. Nobody tells anybody else what to do in the Greens - they simply don't have the authority to do so.

Also, I've never heard anybody except you refer to Bob Brown as "Uncle Bob".

Fair criticism is one thing, but can you please stop fabricating stuff?

C J Morgan

Heh, heh, since you are the Greens' self-appointed Number One supporter whether they want you or not, that extreme defensiveness and personal biff are only to be expected I guess. Sure rots your credibility though.

Here you are C J, pick yourself out in this and stop taking yourself so seriously, because no-one else does:

http://www.crikey.com.au/2010/08/25/greensvoters/

"Extreme defensiveness", Cornflower? Hardly, but if you post utter bulldust I'm happy to correct you.

"Personal biff"? It's pretty obvious you're just trying to pick a fight, but I'm not going to accommodate you.

Why don't you just try debating honestly for a change?

Have a lovely day.

Baygon;
As we will not have control of energy depletion I do not think
we will have control of population depletion.
Over the next 20 years or so we will need to train enough farmers to
have about 50 to 100 times the number of farmers that we currently have
engaged in farming. These figures must be rubbery as we have no idea if
we will be able to apply electric power to farm machinery.

We cannot rely on coal unless we stop exports now as world peak coal is
about 2025.

@Bazz you are an optimist! The latest figures on peak coal suggests 2011 as the peak year.
However, I agree with you - the notion that we can avoid a catastrophic collapse as nature intervenes, is probably widely optimistic.
For many countries around the world there is simply not the option to shift to a sustainable lifestyle. In Australia we still have a chance to create communities that can feed themselves. It is only a small chance it would mean major changes in areas of high urban density and a policy shift in other states which are still rezoning agricultural land for residential use. (Think about it - a hectare of agricultural land could feed perhaps 20 people - turn that into a residential estate for 200 people and not only do you lose the food supply for those 20 people you also have to find an additional 10 hectares of equally productive land to feed the new residents.)
The other part of the equation is that the income from primary production has gone down about 20% whereas costs have increased by about the same number - hence it should come as no surprise that we are losing farm expertise.
Yet whilst it seems to me that there are lots of ordinary folk who understand that we need to make major changes not one of the three parties seem to understand that we simply cannot continue the way we are.
Given that most people would have expected the Greens to understand this best it is clear from CJ Morgan's posts in this thread that not only do they not grasp the problem they are unapologetic about it.

I think there will be a significant reduction in the world's population. However, it will come about by the same means as before. Pestilence, famine, war and other catastrophes will reduce the population. We cannot reduce the population rationally because our social system does not value rationality.

Both major parties support the National School Chaplaincy Program (NSCP) which has loosed fundamentalist Scripture Union beasts of pray on our public school system. The Greens would replace this government sponsored irrationality by trained counsellors. The chaplains are neither equipped to deal with minor mental problems nor to recognize major problems sufficiently to refer the troubled to appropriate treatment.

Support rationality and mental health by getting rid of the NSCP.

Yes Baygon, I agree with you.
I had not heard a closer figure for peak coal than 2025 which was
the date the German study group calculated and a similar figure is in
Richard Heinberg's book Blackout.
As he points out the falling energy content adds to the problem.
Perhaps your date is peak coal energy.

Whichever date it is we will need to be able to use electric power for
farm machinery as diesel will make food too expensive.
There have been suggestions on how to supply the power over large
fields but while the initial expense might be high the running cost
would be quite low.

Do you think the politicians are thinking along these lines ?
Not if you go by my members answer to my question on fuel supply
policy. He answered with a letter all about global warming and how to
reduce CO2. Duuuhhh.

As Katter pointed out we import large amounts, 55%, of what we use.
I wonder if we are borrowing money to pay for our fuel ?
The bill is approaching $30,000,000,000 a year !
Like cockroaches, the best way to reduce the number of people is too
starve them and fertility rates fall automatically.