Coalition to cap population growth in popular suburbs

The Victorian Coalition will slap caps on the number of residents who can move into fast growing suburbs.

Victorian opposition leader Matthew Guy in Melbourne yesterday. Picture: AAP

The Victorian Coalition will put caps on the number of residents who can move into fast-growing suburbs and has called for “tough and honest” conversations on immigration, under a new population policy promising to address overcrowding in the city.

In a major appeal to voters who say they are being choked by congestion in Melbourne’s suburbs, the Coalition promises to boost decentralisation as well as manage the pace of growth in popular suburbs. The Coalition will establish a seven-person population commission to determine sustainable population levels and work with councils to establish caps and targets for housing approvals to manage the numbers of new ­residents.

The policy also includes plans to boost decentralisation, including possible tax breaks and incentives for residents and businesses to move to the regions, as well as initiatives that will direct migrants into regional areas.

Opposition Leader Matthew Guy said unplanned and poorly managed growth was killing Melbourne’s liveability, and dramatic changes were needed to cope with the 2700 new residents settling in Melbourne each week.

“If we don’t take action now, Melbourne will go from the world’s most liveable city to urban claustrophobia,” Mr Guy said. “We need population growth but it needs to be the right growth in the right places at the right time.”

The plan was backed by federal Population Minister Alan Tudge, who said more needed to be done to distribute Melbourne’s growth across the state.

Industry groups, however, say the state needs better planning rather than population limits.

“These challenges aren’t the result of a population that’s too big; it’s the result of poor planning policy that doesn’t allow our industries to properly cater for growth, and the fact some municipalities simply refuse to pull their weight when it comes to accommodating new residents,” Urban Development Institute of Australia director Danni Addison said.

She said the government needed to think carefully about strategies that effectively limited residents’ choices in how and where they lived.

Mr Guy said a population commission would collaborate with state and federal governments to determine the likely population levels for Victoria in 2025, and at 10-year intervals from 2030 until 2100. In suburbs growing too quickly, the commission will recommend localised population limits and targets to prevent over-development, while retaining specified minimum numbers of key workers such as police, doctors and teachers to make sure there are enough to service the population in a given local government area.