The Daily Telegraph editorial: More people, more expensive houses

FOR some time the official consensus on Australia’s migration program has been that it is an unalloyed good that brings in more people to build businesses, grow our economy, fill jobs that would otherwise go begging, and take care of our ageing population.

FOR some time the official consensus on Australia’s migration program has been that it is an unalloyed good that brings in more people to build businesses, grow our economy, fill jobs that would otherwise go begging, and take care of our ageing population.

Any stresses put on housing and infrastructure, the thinking goes, is more than made up for by the benefits of ever more new arrivals.

But this magic pudding view of immigration that suggests we can keep growing without cost is contradicted by the day to day lived experience of Australians who live in areas with fast-growing populations who find themselves increasingly priced out of the housing market.

Now, a new report confirms what many have long suspected: Housing supply is not keeping up with a demand that is being inflated by many years of historically high immigration.

The analysis from the Grattan Institute suggests that Australia consider “tapping the brakes” on our migration numbers to give ordinary battlers a better chance at buying into the housing market.

According to the Institute, Australia’s population has grown by 350,000 people per year thanks to high immigration intakes, versus 220,000 per year in the previous decade.

All this has contributed to making Australia one of the most expensive housing markets in the world.

Survey after survey suggests that we are becoming ever more cynical about the connection between hard work and achieving the dream of owning our own home.

While other remedies are also suggested by the report, including ramping up the construction of new homes and increasing density in inner and middle ring suburbs, these are only temporary solutions if the rate of intake remains as high as it has for more than a decade.

None of this is to suggest lowering the boom on migration entirely. While it may sound cliche the fact is that Australia has always been a nation of migrants, and this is one of the things that makes ours such a dynamic and creative society.

But for trust in the system — and in each other — to be maintained, there needs to be a sense in the community that migration is both a setting that is under the control of policy makers and being done for the right reasons, not just for its own sake.

NO GREY AREA HERE

JUST when it looked like Barnaby Joyce had gotten the message that it was time to step back from the spotlight, there he was again this weekend, this time with a bizarre statement about the paternity of his partner’s child being in “a grey area” and how he’d never been asked the question.

Former deputy PM Barnaby Joyce and his pregnant partner Vikki Campion at Canberra airport. Picture: Kym Smith

Yet before this newspaper broke the story of Vikki Campion's pregnancy, the first question National Political Editor Sharri Markson put to Joyce’s office was whether her unborn baby was his. It’s another bizarre chapter to this saga and yet another case of Joyce saying one thing when the facts on record say quite another.

NOT SO SWEET FOR KIDS

IN a supposedly egalitarian society like ours, demography should not be destiny.

Yet the reality is too often far different, with the outcomes for children born into poorer families too often far worse than for those whose parents are better off.

A new report from Deakin University confirms this grim reality, with researchers discovering that the risk of obesity is higher for kids from poorer families because their parents were more likely to get them hooked on sugary beverages and fatty snacks at a young age.

Overweight children are more likely to come from lower socio-economic families.

As a result, one in three children from low socio-economic backgrounds are obese or overweight at age 10 to 11, while only one in six kids from wealthier backgrounds are in the same condition.

The good news is that people can change their behaviour to make their kids better off.

While parental choice remains important, there are a wealth of strategies to get the message out to parents — namely that children need to eat healthier, and that those under one year of age shouldn’t be having anything to drink but water or milk.

Originally published as The Daily Telegraph editorial: More people, more expensive houses