Trusting this government to fix the broken migration system is foolish

How can anyone trust anything this government and these two ministers in particular say – far less, actually do – about immigration?

Minister for Home Affairs, Clare O'Neil.

How can anyone trust anything this government and these two ministers in particular say – far less, actually do – about immigration?

That is the most basic question raised by the proposed, supposed ‘‘fixing’’ of our ‘‘broken’’ migration system.

This question has got nothing to do with ideology, or even more basic politics, but simple, basic competence.

For this is the duo that just delivered the utter shambles over the High Court ruling on indefinite detention.

If we had a government led by a prime minister who even just pretended to prize integrity and competence, they would have already both been sacked.

In comparison with the complexities and challenges of our overall migration program, handling the indefinite detention issue should have been a doddle.

Yet, rabbits in the proverbial Clare – sorry glare – of the spotlight would have been more nimble than this hapless, hopeless pair.

And we are supposed to believe we can trust them with structuring and implementing the bringing in of 4-5 million migrants over the next decade.

Think about that: not just another Adelaide pouring in, but almost another Melbourne – mostly, to flood into Melbourne and Sydney.

Nothing could have been more stark or reflective of utter cluelessness on the part of the duo than to have their big announcement flanked by the head of the Business Council and the acting head of the ACTU. Here was Big Government, Big Business, and Big Labour all agreeing on a commitment to the Big Australia population Ponzi. And stuff you, citizens of already well and truly stuffed Melbourne and Sydney, and increasingly Brisbane as well.

Nothing in the proposed ‘‘reforms’’ addressed either the Ponzi in the broad or the specific disasters flowing from the mad, bad and dangerous population escalator we are now on, and which is running out of control.

That is, the way we think we have to bring in more and more people to build all the extra houses and increasingly multistorey apartments and infrastructure that we need to service all the extra people living in Melbourne and Sydney because of that immigration. If you had to pick out one problem above dozens, it’s the way the big infrastructure builds have sucked up tradies and sent both their labour costs and building material costs soaring.

Yet these changes do nothing to boost tradie inflows. All O’Neil could claim was that they weren’t doing anything to make it harder to get them, among the 300,000-plus migrants that will still flood in each year. Don’t want to upset the union mates.

Coincidentally, on Monday morning, HSBC’s chief economist Paul Bloxham highlighted how you could sum up 2023 (for Australia) in one chart – soaring migration to over 500,000 net in a single year. Just about everything – good and bad – in the economy flowed from that.

But as Bloxham also pointed out, in the budget just last October, migration was predicted at just 235,000.

Missed by ‘‘just that much’’.

Trust an incompetent government, composed of incompetent ministers, led by an absent PM? And advised by an inept treasury? Be my guest.

Originally published as Trusting this government to fix the broken migration system is foolish