+1 You will find connections amongst these networks to some very dubious organisations and people in the USA who are worse than simple anti pop/immn growth - environmental issues lobbyists which they claim.... especially when even neo cons avoid them all roads lead to Rome, yet same are active in Oz under various guises... one of the king pings of the anti pop/immn movement in USA was an admirer of the "White Australia" policy.....

individual "On the other hand it would be a good start if one didn't make a distinction."

I bet you can make a distinction between Chinese and Tibetan, eh?
Or Zulus and Bushmen.
Or Eskimos and Sioux.

Oh, but you can't distinguish "Australian" from Tibetan, Bushmen or Sioux.

Would it really be a "good start" to eliminate every ethnicity on Earth?
I can't believe you think you're ethically superior to me!

You are promoting genocide. Hitler is *your* buddy, not mine.

Cheryl,

<We cannot find enough skilled and unskilled workers to do the jobs that are needed (yes there are unemployed, but they don’t seem willing to move where the work is).>
According to Roy Morgan research, we have a real 10% unemployment rate and an 8% underemployment rate. Of course these people are happy to live on Newstart at $35 a day and skip meals rather than take a job at the award wage that is going begging. Nothing to do with employers preferring migrants who have already been trained and will put up with more because they want sponsorship for permanent residence or are ineligible for welfare. How on earth do the countries without mass migration ever manage?

< We have one of the lowest population densities on earth.>
Not as low as the Sahara Desert or Antarctica, and for much the same reasons. See
http://www.australianpoet.com/boundless.html

<A diverse society is more interesting, stimulating and rewarding to live in than a monoculture>
Sure, but why isn’t ~88,000 a year (zero net migration) enough, plus some temporary migration. Do we really need to double the population every 43 years?
<Migrants bring skills and knowledge which we may not have>
See previous comment.

<In Australia, population growth is positively correlated with economic growth (States and regions with the fastest population growth have the fastest per capita economic growth) >
Correlation doesn’t imply causation. Good economic performance attracts people, and some countries are doing well without population growth. In any case, do you seriously think that we can go on adding people and using up more and more stuff forever?

<A larger population allows us to benefit from economies of scale in sharing infrastructure costs and gives critical mass for services that need large population bases to be viable, like high-quality orchestras and expensive state-of-the-art medical equipment>
The 2006 Productivity Commission report also talks about diseconomies of scale. It says that net benefit is inconclusive. Sydney and Melbourne already had enough critical mass for high-quality orchestras, etc. in the 1970s when we had 13 million people.

Cheryl,

The Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF) has more than 40,000 members, who directly elect 35 members to their Council, which is responsible for policy. The idea that Ian Lowe could make policy on his own, or even do it in coordination with a small group of fanatics, is laughable. As he has made no secret of his views, I doubt if he could have ever been elected ACF President if he didn't have a lot of support from the members. By the way, he didn't write the submission. Then there is also the supporting evidence listed in the submission from government reports or peer-reviewed journals. Are all these scientists in it together as part of some conspiracy?

The truth is that people love scientists when their findings lead to yummy new consumer goods or cures for their ailments. It is quite another story when the scientists' findings, or the policy implications of those findings, are a threat to someone's financial interests or pet ideology. Some of us act like grown-ups and accept that we are being told the truth or what is likely to be the truth, even if we don't like it. Others claim that there is some sort of conspiracy. Is global warming also poppycock? How about evolution?

Perhaps you and Andras should wear the label 'environmental vandal' with pride, just as you expect all of us to wear 'racist' and 'anti-pop'.

Shockadelic, I am concerned with social cohesion as well. I am just not convinced that the problems are due to race rather than culture and the way the government has been managing immigration.

Unemployment and underemployment have nothing to do with population. One of the problems is a shortage of skills in specific areas such as engineers, motor mechanics and much more. See the skills list in the article. No argument re Morgan's figures.

Are you quoting the poet? I heard him try take on Bernie Salt on population in Melbourne some time ago. It was embarrassing for all concerned and especially for the poet. He used the stock standard anti-market and anti-growth responses too.

Economic growth is predicated on a raft of factors, the least important is population. Population gives scale and is important for large scale manufacturing and growing service industry. Actually, it's individual people, education, skills and motivation that top the list.

The 2006 Prod Comm conducted no investigation in to benefits of migration. They said it was a 'line ball' but used no methodology to assert their statement. They needed to do a longitudinal study over two generations.

I don't have the scientific credentials to determine whether Global warming is poppycock or not, or whether seas levels are rising or fracking causes earthquakes or whether polar bears are drowning. What some 'scientists' and commentators have done is use system theory to try and explain everything but end up explaining nothing.

Are you equating Darwin's theory of evolution with AGW?

Malcolm and Cheryl,

Is this paid or unpaid sport ?

You have brought a level of debate that teased out how we have just lost 30% of our coast to urbanisation. This has all happened in very recent times .

At what point do you want to save the last of the natural habitat , for those species who share the coastal strip ?

Say leave none or 2% , which will not allow the survival of a wild system ?

Kind regards,
Ralph