You hear people like Rob Adams and Marcus Spiller saying there is nothing you can do about population growth in Victoria and Australia. Wrong. For a start the government should cancel the Live in Victoria website that invites people to come to Victoria and which explains how to get a visa. There is one in every state (Qld, NSW, the ACT, Tasmania[1], SA, WA, NT). They should all be pulled off the web.
Results of Melbourne population poll, added to this article on 16 April 2011.
http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/citys-population-explosion-20110331-1cng1.html
Having been involved with trying to save Melbourne from overdevelopment for many years, numerous conservation and environment activists are convinced that no government can manage the speed and magnitude of growth.
It's bleeding obvious.
So tell them at The Age. Comment and vote via the link supplied to a poll in The Age today. And stop buying property. That only lines bankers' and developers' pockets and gives them more power over politicians. The Age is not Melbourne's 'better' newspaper, it's just a a huge international property developer and financier. So is the Australian, with www.realestate.com.au. That's the real news. Sadly it's a long time since there was much real news in those papers.
Then tell the Feds that we want to reduce Melbourne's population so stop importing so many immigrants. For years now Victorian Premiers have been demanding more immigrants of the federal government in order to please big business. Make our leaders care about democracy.
Nothing is inevitable unless you let it be so.
The Victorian Coalition has admitted that funds don't exist to finance the infrastructure needed to stuff all these new people in with a giant shoehorn - so why do we want even more people?
The answer is that we don't want them; the property developer and financier-run government does.
Tell those parasites to get the infrastructure fixed and then ask us again and listen to the answer.
Global capital exploits overpopulation so we must regulate global capital to get democracy.
Comments
Milly Osborne (not verified)
Fri, 2011-04-01 12:35
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Ponzi pyramid scheme
We are going down the same route as Sydney. It was a beautiful city, but ruined by lack of infrastructure. The "shortage" of services is really euphemism for too many people and overpopulation. The costs of population growth outstrip the benefits.
A Ponzi scheme is a fraud built on pushing the plausible belief that money coming into the investment entity will forever be increasing. At core the new population growth push is the ultimate national pyramid scheme. We need to get to 36 -- or 50? -- million, to have the taxpaying workforce to support the now ageing baby-boomers? This would wreck our environment and living standard even further. What can more people do that can't be done now? The immigration Ponzi scheme highlights how bereft of intellect our political parties have become. We import more people to look after our aging population is a rationale that is illogical and misanthropic. Do they think these new people also won't grow old and require care? It's beyond absurd. We mindlessly expand until we explode. A real economy should be reliant on innovation, manufacturing and production, not property that relies on perpetual population growth. A plague of bacteria will eventually eat its host, and die. Similarly, we are eating away at our own future.
admin
Fri, 2011-04-01 15:42
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Population growth creates diseconomies, not economies, of scale
Bandicoot
Sat, 2011-04-02 10:27
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Liberals continue unsustainable population growth
kika (not verified)
Sat, 2011-04-02 12:41
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Land Bubble Soon to Burst
James Sinnamon
Sat, 2011-04-02 16:58
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Housing bubble burst would be a gain for most
Canvas Bags (not verified)
Wed, 2012-07-04 17:18
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Canvas Bags
Hi! Just a quick note to let you know that your blog has proven to be of great value to what I am working on right now. Thanks!
Canvas Bags
Editorial comment: This advertisement within a comment has been approved because it advertises an apparently ethical and environmentally sound product. Thank you for expressing your appreciation of candobetter.
VivKay (not verified)
Wed, 2011-04-06 07:40
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Melbourne importing high density lifestyles
CSQTownPlanner (not verified)
Mon, 2012-04-23 19:14
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urban planners
The Melbourne population is increasing everyday and more housing demand is also increasing. Australia's rapid population growth had placed considerable strain on existing health infrastructure, services, with citizens of bigger cities suffering from more pollution, longer commuting times etc.
Editorial comment: Link to CSQ Town Planning removed. In spite of the apparent praise for candobetter, this is clearly advertising for a company that promotes urban 'growth ' and was posted by a forum spammer. - Ed, 12 Aug 2014
John Marlowe
Fri, 2012-04-27 21:16
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Melbourne town planning is a concrete refugee camp
Melbourne town planning has become a concrete refugee camp.
As the Feds spew the hoards into Tulla, the locals are forced to make room for them.
These Refugees for the Good Life get a better deal than Melbourne's inner city homeless.
Whitlam's multicultural ghettos are infecting the city all over.
'Southern Dar es Salaam' or 'Southern Chongqing' may be better names for the old Melbourne locals once knew.
John Marlowe
VivKay (not verified)
Sat, 2011-04-16 15:04
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"Tough" budget ahead despite the "prosperity" from growth
Confidential Treasury figures showed a $13 billion fall in economic growth for this financial year.
The Treasurer will announce forecast growth of just 2.25 per cent, far lower than the 3.25 per cent forecast in the November budget.
Treasurer Wayne Swan revealed that the combined effects of floods, cyclones, a rising dollar and weaker economy, had wiped $4.5 billion off expected revenue.
With Labor committed to returning the budget to surplus in 2012/13, unemployment benefits could be ripe for spending cuts. Ms Gillard said government spending needed to be cut so public spending didn't crowd out private investment. Privatisation has been the downfall of this country. It hasn't worked in the US and it doesn't work here.
As if introducing a carbon tax in addition to the increasing cost of utilities, food and inflation wasn't enough, the government are now about to target some of the poorest in the population.
Population growth became a key election issue last year after Julia Gillard expressed concerns about a “big Australia” in the wake of Treasury’s projection that the nation’s population would reach 35 million by 2050.
The Property Council’s submission to Tony Burke's national population strategy points out the dangers of a low population growth policy, saying it would “dramatically increase burdens on taxpayers”.
However, less people would also mean less dis-economies of scale, and less need for all the upgrades and infrastructure spending.
“Immigration will help future-proof the country as our aging population sees us slip beyond this current demographic sweet spot.." Do they imagine that immigrants don't age? Keeping a population "young" would mean a massive and continual influx of new people that would blow out our budget and carrying capacity forever! The fact is that nothing will keep Australia's population young. The myth of an aging population threat is one perpetuated by those with vested business interests. It is population growth - and young people - that consumes public spending, not older people.
Editor's comment: I could spend a lot of time responding to all the points made in VivKay's incisive comment.
The newsmedia ideologues and Government insist that they have no choice but to reduce spending on useful services and infrastructure in order to get Australia's budget out of 'deficit', as if the deficits that will inevitably result from these cutbacks will be any less real than the financial deficits they are supposed to save us from.
Isn't it strange that during the years in which the Hawke, Keating and Howard Governments savagely reduced spending to keep our federal budget in surplus that none of the ideologues, who lavished praise on these governments, noticed the massive deficit in skills that was the result of these cutbacks?
Then a few years ago, the economists, who helped bring about this deficit, suddenly noticed and and began to demand higher 'skills' immigration to reduce this deficit of their own making. Of course, they neglect to mention that providing infrastructure for so many new immigrants is precisely the reason why the Federal and state governments are so much in financial deficit today.
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