Andrew Bartlett -

Well done on Muslims being compatible with Australia. I know many Muslims / Middle Easterners that are valuable and important contributors to our country and I agree there are nutjobs in all religions and secular nutjobs, as well.

As far as a stable population I can't understand why we can't have a stable population around 21 or 22 million instead of 30 million. With a lower population it will be much easier to live sustainably. Especially when we can't rely on cheap fossil fuels as we do now.

What is your description of a "precipitous" decline in population? We have never seen any kind of population decline in Australia and if we did it would be simple enough to increase immigration again (if that is what people wanted). Worrying about population decline seems about as important as worrying about a disastrous fight between the tooth fairy and the Easter Bunny.

I can see that the total Gross Domestic Product would be less with a stable population around 21 or 22 million (compared to 30), but are you absolutely sure that the living standards for the average family would decrease. I don't think they would. We would certainly produce less greenhouse gas, have more water per person and take the pressure off our farmland. It would also be a lot easier to get over the Harbour Bridge on Friday evening.

Please remind me again of the way in which we can encourage the world population to stablise, while we are pushing for increases in Australia's population. Aren't we saying to the rest of the world "do as I say, not as I do?" Seems hypocritical.

Thanks again for taking the time to respond.

so Andrew Bartlett,

you are actually proposing a target population for Australia of about 30 million by 2050,correct?

A little less than ABS series b - at last - an honest politician who is prepared to give us a honest view - thankyou - I hope your leader doesnt object.

This represents about 27 million by 2020 , or 35 % more than at present.

My question is why - what benefits do you expect people to realise from this; and what losses? What are you basing your views on?

Where are you proposing to put this extra 7 million. Not to SEQ I hope!! Oh, and will manicure artists and pastry chefs still have top priority - can never get enough of these highly skilled people?

As regards your comment " a policy of zero net migration – a precipitous crash in our population". You are setting up a straw man - no one has suggested a "precipitous crash".

What about a strategy to produce a steady decline in our population; or if you prefer a stable population at current levels? Surely this could be achieved?

But as regards a "precipitous crash" in our population, I will suggest that it might be better to do this in a controlled way, rather than wait for peak oil and climate change to do it for us. At least we should be thinking about this.

Or do you believe in G Bush's energy tooth fairies? Perhaps you think ethanol or hydrogen will rescue us?

I am genuinely sorry that you and most politians seeem to share similar views on population - I believe this is because you are hostage to big Media, big business, the HIA and, for balance, Tasmanian Forestry Unions.

Common Andrew, break the mould!!

In Australia our rapid population growth and overpopulation are not led by natural increase. Our population is growing too fast because of government policy to build it up through high immigration, in addition to natural increase.

This is a political problem.

In Australia we have pro- immigration government and pro-immigration opposition because the industries in our commodity economy derive their major profits from population growth. The Fairfax and Murdoch media actually both own huge international property dot coms. Television and radio market property speculation through consumer lifestyle programs. Unsurprisingly then, the mainstream press simply blackballs political commentators who criticize high immigration. A politician that says they want more immigration gets great coverage.

The policies these beneficiaries of population growth influence governments to make can be fought like other policies, such as paying for courses in university which should be free.

Overpopulation in Australia is the result of bad policies. It is not an inevitable natural event.

We can legitimately and we should, responsibly, have some political input, because none of this has to be.

The policies of our government and future governments must change in order to avoid increasing the problems of overpopulation in Australia. Moderation of immigration numbers is a part of this.

Moderating immigration numbers does not mean being nasty to refugees and asylum seekers.

Less than 10% of immigrants are in those humanitarian categories. Almost all our intake comes from the educated middle classes of other countries, and they have many choices.

Instead of taking 130,000 economic migrants in and only 10,000 people who face life and death issues of persecution in their countries, we could take up to 50,000 refugees and only 10,000 people seeking economic advantages. In this way our population would stabilize late this century.

Yes, that would still leave something like a billion people in the world out in the cold, without good shelter or economic roles.

But it would also leave more doctors, nurses and business people with capital to improve the lot of those people who will never be able to leave where they are.

You people are crazies, one and all. Australia is not overpopulated. It is in the fact the world's most UNDERpopulated country. There is plenty of water in Australia for at least double our current population, the main problem being that most of our rainfall occurs in uninhabited places.

The reason we have water shortages in places like Sydney and we have virtually nobody living in our highest rainfall areas is a result of public water subsidies, not overpopulation.

It's pretty ridiculous to think that the malthusian rubbish peddled by the greens has affected so many people. Saying that Australia is overpopulated is close to the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard.

Yobbo, Thursday, 2 February 2006 3:08:05 AM thinks it is crazy to consider Australia overpopulated.

Guess it depends on your definition. The things I value have deteriorated depressingly as population has grown. We will soon be paying more for recycled water than we ever paid for fresh water. I loath the traffic; it wastes my time and energy. My hospital workplace is replacing experienced locals with temporary immigrants to avoid retaining people it has to pay more per hour. This is dangerous and nasty. Where I live, richly biodiverse bushland, forested continuously for between 60 and 90 million years, is being fragmented and trashed to squeeze more housing in. The rights and concerns of residents are being cashed in by their neighbours and one-time friends. Continuous housing turnover undermines the community network of mutual obligations and respect. A corporatised council deals with developers over our heads. State government overrides councilor protests for what I see as childishly naïve and corrupt economic priorities in the Melbourne 2030 developer-push for population growth. Land-prices are rising due to the internationalization of the real-estate market and investment in population growth. Ditto debt. When land prices rise so does everything else. I should not need to explain to you how that works. There is conflict over space everywhere, e.g jet skis vs dogs vs swimmers at the beach. Parking is sometimes impossible downtown. Crossing a rural highway by car has become dangerous because of volume and speed of traffic. You might see this as exciting competition. I see this as falling for a new series of enclosures and poor laws as fossil fuel decline looms. The protection of complex water ‘servicing’ infrastructure relies on the survival of civil government and the ability to maintain it technically and organizationally. Given that our fossil fuel based societies have only been going since the 1750s and I see signs of political and technological entropy I am not in favor of going ahead with higher populations and increasingly complex systems. I tip a population crash to about 1 million in Australia within approx 130 years.

'Yobbo' wrote (http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=4099#29455)

"It's not supposed to be funny, genius ... I can have a narrow viewpoint and still be correct."

...

"[Deleted for flaming.] It's not my problem if you have a nervous breakdown when someone even mentions the word "gun". Grow up."

No, actually, I didn't seriously believe that you intended be funny. Also, it's beyond me why anyone would think that the perspective from the barrel of a gun would be an appropriate metaphor for this forum.

Kanga (http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=4099#29700),

Thank you for spelling out concretely what overpopulation means in practical terms.

Up here in South East Queensland, the Beattie Labor Government plans to cram in another 1 million people by 2026. Up until 8 December last year it had attempted to depict itself as reluctantly responding to the problems caused by the movement of so many people from the South.

Then on 8 December last year, to perversely celebrate the birth of Queensland's four millionth habitant, at a time when our water reserves were running dry, our hospitals were unable to meet the demand for their services and we were threatened with blackouts over summer, the Queensland government placed, at taxpayers' expense, full page advertisements in the Courier Mail and, presumably, other national capital dailies, encouraging people from other states to move here.

So, now without any word of explanation to the Queensland public the Beattie Government is now adding to the problems that it had claimed earlier that it was trying to solve.

Andrew, could I ask you to please take a stance against this insanity? You can demand that the Queensland government call off its reckless population boosting campaign, presumably done at the behest of property developers who contribute so generously to Labor Party coffers, and you can add your voice to the demands for a cutback in immigration numbers which is ultimately driving the overcrowding of South East Queensland.

If you don't than what chance do the various communities in Queensland such as in Maleny(http://www.malenyvoice.com/), Montville, Redland Shire (http://www.carp-redlands.org.au/), the Gold Coast (http://www.gecko.org.au/), Minnippi (http://members.optusnet.com.au/minnippi) etc, have of succeeding in their struggles against overdevelopment?