I agree that there is a lack of rational debate about immigration policy. But the policy basis for 'regular' immigration is set out quite clearly, with four defined purposes, on the Immigration Department’s website and it is easy to judge whether it meets Conrad Liveris' call for a bigger picture. I think it does.

On the other hand humanitarian immigration policy is much less clear, even lacking an articulated overarching purpose. As I have said here before, there ought to be one and I suggest it be something like 'Australia offers refuge to those in greatest need'. From that humble start I reckon a lot of detailed policy could be developed, especially by the bureaucrats who ought to be familiar with the global refugee scene. But one thing is certain. A heavy influx of boat arrivals would neutralise any humanitarian policy designed to assist those in greatest need. The much maligned policy of ‘stopping the boats’ is in reality one aspect of a sound humanitarian refugee policy

<< Why are we not talking about the suitable level of immigration? We seem to be avoiding it. >>

Well Conrad, we’ve been talking about it on this forum for years.

<< Immigration brings with it too many opportunities for us to assume it has but one dimension. >>

And a whole big swathe of problems.

Conrad, for one who is...

< working in business development and policy with a focus on gender equality and intergenerational issues. >

...you don’t seem to be bearing a single thought of intergenerational issues in this article. In fact, your article is very narrowly focussed indeed.

The biggest issue of all regarding our current rate of immigration is that it makes up some two thirds of our very high rate of population growth…. on a largely arid and semi-arid continent with poor soil quality and erratic rainfall…. and which already has a big enough population.

Very high immigration generates an enormous demand for evermore basic infrastructure and services, which existing residents pay for, and which does NOT improve the quality of life for pre-existing citizens.

The economic activity that is generated by immigrants is +/- equal to the demands that they create. It DOESN’T lead to overall improvements for our whole society. Not now nor into the future. But it DOES make us ever less able to achieve a sustainable society.

We CAN have a MUCH smaller immigration intake, of about net zero, and have a considerably increased refugee intake at the same time. THIS is what we should be striving to achieve. THIS would be the best balance between heading towards a sustainable society, which is of CRITICAL importance, and being a good global citizen by way of doing our bit to resettle some of the world’s most desperately needy refugees.

continued

Conrad, I hope that you can see the need to consider this sort of stuff when discussing immigration, rather than just rather blithely viewing our very high immigration rate as an entirely good thing… which is the underlying theme that comes through in your article.

Your article is titled ‘A call for the big picture’, but there is scant little in it that suggests that you can see anything like the big picture here.

Judith Sloan correctly noted that Australia has a well-functioning migration scheme
Conrad Leveris,
Judith Sloan must be hiding somewhere away from the present goings-on. Australia HAD a well functioning migration scheme.

Well, if we could but relocate all of Israel to these shores, and into a large empty mid/north western Australia, where the Mediterranean climate and conditions, would make them feel completely at home.
Incidentally, this would resolve most of the stated reasons for conflict in the Middle East!
Not that that would necessary bring actual peace, given common thugs, brigands and cold blooded compulsive murders, would find other targets and other reasons to continue to brutalize their own women and children; each other, and spill as much or even more blood!
A new Israel, would give the ultra wealthy Jewish world, huge reasons to invest here and in it!
These people are proven innovators, who have already made one desert bloom.
And their military might and inventory, transferred here, would make us doubly strong and virtually self reliant!
We would have to consult with the traditional owners, and make a very strong economic case, for transferring title of a rather large slice of land to new immigrants. Who have always been made very welcome by traditional owners! Or perhaps, all we need do, is transfer the title of a couple of cattle stations and their water resources, and then call that, New Israel?
We will one day not too far ahead in time, cease to be a minerals exporter, and need to have a strategy, to grow a modern successful exporting economy.
And one which produced the cheapest energy, and the lowest tax system, (all very doable) would involve huge compulsion on the part of many peoples, and perhaps even whole nations, to relocate here!
Rhrosty.

"what do we want Australia to look like?"

There will never be serious discussion about immigration, because people like this author really don't want to hear an honest answer.

When our irresponsible, destabilising, absurd intake of millions from any and every culture brings about a civil war, you'll get your answer.

The people left standing.
They're what we want Australia to look like.

Conrad,
Your writing may have had some credence in the 1950’s, none at all now.
As Ludwig points out, we live in a land with scarce and depleting resources of arable land. The existing population is only supported by the profligate use of fossil fuels.
Look ahead a decade when oil and gas are in significant decline, do you think Australia can support its population. Can the world support 9 billion plus?
Australia should be setting an example by reducing its population. Foreign aid should be to assist other countries to live within their means.
Australia doesn’t need any more migrants from any source.

Here's the BIG PICTURE:

The last time Conrad wrote an article of OLO. He was bemoaning "white privilege"--whilst keeping his own white butt firmly seated in his own privileged position

This time around Conrad is -- in effect --urging we open our borders to any illegal who chooses to boat in.

Do you get the picture?

You could go in harder Conrad with these mongrels:

http://www.onlineopinion.com.au/view.asp?article=16485

It's like Bill and Ben the Flowerpot Men, where there's Shocka, there's Ludwig, his cackling enabler. If you wonder why the depopulationists want to slash immigration, then read the above article plus type in 'John Tanton' and 'Roy Beck' - their international supporters. You'll soon get the idea.

I note the writer is interested in intergenerational issues. That's the shape of things to come in Australia.

There's more to life than just existing & that's what the pro immigration crowd doesn't understand. They are too insipid to comprehend that their idealism is costing them their life as they know it.
99.9 % of the so-called or even genuine refugees from the middle east have no concept of quality of life in a natural surrounds. They're simply & who can blame them, trying to go somewhere where there aren't bullets whizzing around their ears at any given moment. They do not for one moment consider that other, slightly more sane people are treasuring the life they have managed to establish in this country, do not wish to jeopardise this quality of life by inheriting the middle eastern problems & perpetute them here.
To middle easterners beautiful bushland with quiet surrounds means nothing whereas we value it greatly. They are enclave people favouring masses.

In the past, I have wondered what positive things immigration has done for me personally.

I am still wondering, because I can’t think of anything.

The things I liked doing in the past, such as fishing and surfing, I no longer do much anymore, as the fishing spots and surfing breaks are overcrowded due to overpopulation.

So nearly 100% reduction in my quality of life, due to overpopulation that mostly comes from immigration.

A multicultural society from immigration is a complete joke.

Australia is hugely Americanised in our politics, in our cultural pursuits, in the way we shop, and even in the way we eat, but someone born here can now feel a complete stranger in their own street, with no feeling of national identity at all, due to so many immigrants.

Another zero for immigration, and of course another zero for immigration improving our natural environment, because it hasn’t.

Unless someone thinks increased consumption and increased clearing of native bushland to build more suburban jungles is improving the natural environment.

But the biggest zero, and the biggest joke, would be that immigration improves the country economically.

Federally, we seem to have a debt of $320 billion, with a total household debt of $1.84 trillion, and about 7 unemployed for every available or vacant job.

So personally, immigration has done zero for me, and nationally, immigration seems to be doing zero also, unless overpopulation of the country is considered to be a positive, or a short term to medium term goal.

There are two main camps of pro-immigrationists. Some just don't understand that there are no "boundless plains to share", or that just because mass migration was of general benefit in the past that it necessarily always will be in a very different world. Australia really isn't a big country. It is a small to medium sized country wrapped around a big desert. Most of what isn't desert is semi-arid rangeland, with only about 6% arable. The average quality of our arable land is very low. From World Bank figures, we got 2.2 tonnes of grain per hectare in 2012 (a good year), while France got 7.5 tonnes, and we only got 1.1 tonnes in 2006, a drought year. See these rainfall and soil quality maps from Dr. Chris Dixon of the CSIRO

http://www.australianpoet.com/boundless.html

See also this inherent land quality map of the world from the US Department of Agriculture

http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/detail/soils/use/worldsoils/?cid=nrcs142p2_054011

We also have serious problems with land degradation and environmental deterioration. The Australian Academy of Science looked at all these issues in 1994 and recommended a safe upper limit to our population of 23 million.

The second group of pro-immigrationists are motivated by greed. While the average citizen doesn't benefit economically (see the 2006 Productivity Commission report on immigration, esp. p. 154) and has to put up with a more degraded environment and a lesser quality of life due to crowding and congestion, the population growth acts as a giant siphon pumping wealth up to the top 1%, especially in the FIRE sector [Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate]. They get bigger domestic markets, easy profits from speculation in residential land and other vital resources, and a cheap, compliant work force that they don't even have to train. It was recently reported that the median house price in Sydney has now passed $800,000.

Malcolm King wants to pretend that this is all about racism, not greed. He doesn't mention that he has a public relations company. Despite being repeatedly challenged, he refuses to deny that this company is being paid to rubbish people who want to stabilize the population (not 'depopulate').

I most certainly do assert that much of the commentary about this issue is about racism and you Divergence and the SPA/SPP, are its greatest proponents. I note the SPP has backed completely away from its more hardline policies of one child, then two child - and now its ok to have kids but we'll penalise you through the welfare system.

Why would anyone pay me to lambast you and SPP? It be like KPMG hiring an agency to attack a university debating club, so few are your supporters, so obvious are your links to Number USA, Roy Beck and John Tanton in America.

I'm surprised (although not really) that you're still trotting out your instrumentalist take on the PC, thinking, wrongly, that they were running a tape measure over the personal economic worth of migrants. You got slapped down hard - rather funnily I might add - when one of the authors of the 2010 report wondered what the hell you were talking about. I'm still wondering about your links to the ACF and whether you're a two handed glove puppet for them and the SPP/SPA (same thing).

Now I hear you're sounding like a Marxist, wanting to stick it to the big end of town. You poor buggers can't even work out whether you're Reds or supporters of the KKK. The latter me thinks. Good luck with the burning cross thing.

Divergence,

Yes, I am astonished at how easily supporters of overpopulation can make claims that “We have boundless plains to share”

This paper puts arable land in Australia at slightly higher than your 6%, and puts it at 10%, but it qualifies this by saying “Much of this [10%] is marginal with respect to water and nutrient regimes.”

http://www.ruralplanning.com.au/library/papers/rapinat99.pdf

Further it states “Once viable farming units are now being made into smaller less viable units and the use changed to residential-type uses with no realisation about the impacts of this on such issues as land degradation, rural land use conflict or the cumulative impact of the loss to production of this good agricultural land.”

So agriculture and native wildlife out, and residential-type uses in.

Not good news for farmers and native wildlife, but good news for the real estate industry.

Claims that we have “ boundless plains to share” don’t seem to be related to any scientific facts.

Such claims are just propaganda and brainwashing being used to create myths and misinformation within the public.

Immigration may have had some positives in the days when we practiced integration. Now with multiculturalism, it is all down hill. Still many locally born citizens were forced out of their suburbs when they were taken over by one ethnic group, even back then.

Today however, when it is almost impossible to find someone who speaks English when asking for directions in many major areas, it is really bad.

Places like Parramatta, Fairfield, Cabramatta & Liverpool, where English is optional, makes the country much poorer, & bordering on ungovernable.

ALL immigration should be stopped, until we have absorbed the huge numbers we have taken in, & until everyone can converse & write in English.

Things like drivers licence tests should be conducted in English only, to give encouragement for immigrants to learn our language.

Malcolm 'Paddy' King, "so few are your supporters".

So why are you so hysterically obsessed with a non-entity like SPP then?

You don't just comment about them all the time, you write an *article* every few weeks!
Get over it!

"Good luck with the burning cross thing"

And good luck with the 6000-cultures-in-one-street utopian lunacy.

Why is it "racist" to acknowledge "Australians", as they are historically understood, are White/European.

Nobody disputes that Zulus are Black or Koreans are Asian.

Zulus and Koreans are never claimed to be people of *every and any* ancestry.

But apparently "Australians" can be anything, despite the litany of portraits, photographs and films of "Australians" going back two centuries, that show White, White and more White faces.

That is no more "evil" than a record of Zulu history showing Black, Black and more Black faces.

We never asked for this redefinition/transformation.

There were no marches in the streets (even in the 60s!) demanding a broadening of immigration to include any and all peoples.

This change was *imposed* on us.
We have every right to object to it.

That doesn't mean we "hate" anyone or want to harm anyone.
We just want it to stop now, while a liveable future is still possible.

What exactly is the purpose of this article?
Just another chat about immigration being good without doing the analysis?

If/when you look at an issue like immigration/population, then you have to
- look at the environmental impact and if indeed the land can sustain further population increases
- look at the impact on social infrastructure. Do we have the necessary social infrastructure to accommodate an endless stream of newcomers? short answer: no
- look at the impact on physical infrastructure. Do we have the necessary physical infrastructure to accommodate an endless stream of newcomers? short answer: no
- Employment opportunities. Feedback from a senior Centrelink officer 2 days ago is that unemployment stands at 13%. So forget the official 6%. That 13% does not include under-employment.
- What impact does an endless stream of newcomers have on social cohesion? Is multi-kulti really a good idea? It works in some cases, it does not work in others. We must distinguish here if we want to live in a harmonious society.
- Would it in summa summarum not be much better to look at population decrease if we look at the big and future picture.
- Finally, leave out emotional issues like asylum seekers. They are a global problem and should be handled globally by the UNHCR.

What exactly is your definition of a racist, Paddy? Anyone who isn't overjoyed with unending population growth (hardly the dictionary definition}? If I or the Sustainable Population Party, or Sustainable Population Australia, or NumbersUSA really were racist, it would be easy to point to something in my posts or on these organisations' websites that expresses hatred or contempt for people on the basis of their race. You haven't done this because you can't. All these organisations support a nondiscriminatory immigration policy. Their concerns are with numbers, not bad people. For example

http://www.numbersusa.com/about/no-immigrant-bashing

You are simply using "racist" as a smear with no content, roughly equivalent to "double plus ungood".

My quotes from Productivity Commission reports have been accurate (with links) and not taken out of context. They have nothing to do with the "personal economic worth" of individual migrants. They have to do with whether there is a significant per capita economic benefit for existing residents from the whole program. For example (see page 6):

"An understanding of the economic impacts of immigration is sometimes clouded by misperception. Two benefits that are sometimes attributed to immigration, despite mixed or poor evidence to support them, are that:
*immigration is an important driver of per capita economic growth
*immigration could alleviate the problem of population ageing."

http://www.pc.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0016/113407/annual-report-2010-11.pdf

If your friend doesn't like the report being quoted, he should take it up with his colleagues.

I have always believed (and written) that the big end of town is driving high population growth. You attack me for being a Marxist, but don't dispute that (a) the distributional effects of population growth greatly benefit the top 1% as opposed to ordinary people and (b) that Big Business lobbies for very high immigration.

Asking why anyone would pay you is not the same as denying that your company is being paid. If we are as insignificant as you say, why do you waste so much time attacking us, to the point of telling out and out lies? Surely you have something better to do with your time and better targets if you go in for polemic.

Incomuicardo,

From the World Bank figures, 6.2% of our land area (including islands) is arable. The differences between figures from different sources probably relate to exactly what counts as arable land. Sometimes improved grassland is counted, as with the CIA World Fact Book. The overall picture isn't changed much, however.

Divergence

More land may become more marginal if the cost of diesel and electricity continues to rise. A farmer may have a creek nearby, but the farmer still has to pump water to irrigate.

Certainly the cost of irrigation is a very big cost to farmers in the sugar industry, and a reason why so many farmers have left that industry.

Those who believe agriculture can soak up the vast number of immigrants being brought into the country each year have no idea at all.

It may not even be profitable to subdivide farms in the future. I personally know of a farmer whose farm was no longer profitable, and he wanted to subdivide the farm and join the most powerful industry in Australia, which is selling real estate.

However the cost of subdivision was so great, it was not profitable for him to subdivide his farm and sell it as housing blocks.

So that leaves what as an industry to employ all the immigrants and everyone else?