We’ve stopped boats, not the migrant wave

Don’t be fooled by politicians doing their best to distract us from having real and necessary debate over the rate of legal migrants settling in Australia, writes Peta Credlin.

Driving in January’s heat, with kids on the back seat and a few hours to go before you arrive at your destination, is a lesson in the art of distraction.

Whether it’s fighting siblings, the temptation of the golden arches, or general crankiness, getting the focus onto something else (and keeping it there) is the mission of every wily parent.

As crafty as parents can be when it comes to games of distraction, I hate to break it you, but politicians are even better.

Take migration, the legal kind. For the past two or so years, there’s been a grassroots-driven debate right across Australia about our high levels of immigration. Poll after poll has shown that there’s support among Liberal, Labor and very surprisingly, even Greens voters to slow down Australia’s ever-increasing immigration rate.

MORE FROM PETA CREDLIN: A Labor victory will see the boats return

This week, Prime Minister Scott Morrison was quite right to warn against the Kerryn Phelps/Labor-backed bid to give any two doctors the power to order boat people off Nauru and onto Australia, but it is worth noting there’s only a few hundred boat people left in offshore processing while a quarter of a million migrants are coming to Australia every year.

Yes, it’s absolutely critical that we don’t water down a border protection regime that has stopped the deaths at sea.

Independent Dr Kerryn Phelps delivered her Migration Amendment (Urgent Medical Treatment) Bill 2018, in December. Picture: Gary Ramage

The last thing we want is to see the people smuggling trade restarted but, in terms of its immediate impact on Australia, the 50,000 people who came illegally by boat under Labor should not be used by politicians to distract us from a proper national debate about the million plus who came legally in the same period looking for jobs, for housing and for space on our roads and public transport.

MORE FROM PETA CREDLIN: PM must show us he’s listening on immigration

Don’t get me wrong. I’m pro-migrant as every Australian really has to be; after all, a handful of Aboriginal people apart, every single one of us is a migrant or the descendant of migrants.

The issue is not whether we support migrants — because almost everyone does. It’s what we think the rate of migration should be and, at the moment, it’s far too high, with enough migrants arriving every two years to more than fill a city the size of Canberra.

Labor’s line that “everything is going up except wages” is powerful because it’s basically true. And if voters are unhappy, they’ll tend to punish the government even if the alternative has no answer to the problem.

As reported last week, living costs in Australia have outstripped household incomes by 2.9 per cent over the past three years. And that’s why people are finding it harder and harder to make ends meet, despite being told the economy is in great shape.

Record levels of migration is not the only factor here but it’s an iron law of economics that more workers (or more supply) mean downward pressure on wages and more people (or more demand) mean upward pressure on prices, especially housing prices.

It’s typical of our country these days that we argue furiously about relatively minor things while ignoring the things that are really making a difference.

Our leaders are nervous about even mentioning migration because they don’t want to be accused of being anti-migrant (or even racist), nor do they don’t want to be criticised by big business — even though big business has a vested interest in ever higher levels of migration to keep wages low and prices high.

There’s also the fact that the whole Budget is built on the artificial premise of higher and higher immigration because treasury orthodoxy says that high migration boosts GDP (but not necessarily GDP per person).

If you live in the well-to-do suburbs of Sydney or Melbourne it’s easy to be pro-refugee because none of them live nearby.

In the five years to 2015, for instance, in Sydney’s leafy Woollahra, in the seat of Wentworth now held by Phelps, just 17 humanitarian migrants took up residence while Fairfield, out in the western suburbs, received nearly 6000.

The 40 per cent of Woollahra’s population born overseas are mostly white-collar workers from English-speaking countries who have been here for many years. The 60 per cent of Fairfield’s population born overseas are mostly newcomers from non-English-speaking countries; hence the local mayor’s observation that “the government may have stopped the boats — but they put them on buses to Fairfield”.

For the residents of Wentworth more migrants mean a greater pool of people to employ, and more interesting shops and restaurants.

In the outer suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne, more migrants mean more competition for jobs, stagnant wages, rents through the roof, clogged roads and, in some cases, more crime.

When criticised for too-high migration, the government has pointed to the 20,000 drop in permanent residency approvals last year. But Net Overseas Migration (which includes students and “temporary” business migrants all of whom need work, houses and cars) was still the third highest on record.

The government has also talked vaguely about a population inquiry but to report later in the year so that immigration does not become an election issue.

Again, remember here what I said about the politics of distraction?

When mainstream political parties shy away from the issues that countries need to debate, the discussion doesn’t stop. It just gets taken over by fringe groups where sensible distinctions don’t get made.

The best way to avoid an ugly discussion about immigration later, is not to ignore it now.