overseas students

Professor Bob Birrell [1] calls for better planning to stop over-development, sustainable population policy reform at a Sustainable Australia Party event. "Net overseas immigration is completely dominating the figures." The politicians tell us, "We just have to get used to it, and the way we're going to deal with it is to throw literally billions at it ... and ... eliminate suburbia." "That's what they say. But rezoning and high density doesn't actually work. The houses are too expensive. The reason is site costs. The more people the more demand for housing. If you increase the opportunity for housing on the same site, the site values go up higher.... It doesn't work." "Nor does the high rise 'solution'. You know there are tens of thousands of these being completed. When we checked the 2016 census, what we found was, that in the two areas of greatest density, CBD and South bank, only 5% of all those appartments were occupied by families with children. Well, what are we going to do about it? We have to deal with high NOM (Net Overseas Migration), it's not inevitable - and this is the key point. The high levels of NOM at present are due to government policy or government non-policy. They are a deliberate consequence of government policy. Not inevitable. For example, overseas students. It is a fact that the biggest source of growth in Net Overseas Migration in Melbourne is overseas students. There are more overseas students coming in on a student's visa each year than are leaving holding a student's visa. Okay, we don't object to students coming here for an education. the problem is that, once they get here and complete their education, they can stay on, more or less forever. Our governments have deliberately encouraged them to do so. By providing, as of right, a two year stay here, with full work rights - even if your degree is in cultural studies - and, when you've done that, you can get another student visa. Or you can become a tourist, or you can get a working holiday visa, or you can apply for a 457 temporary visa. Or you can apply for a permanent entry visa. And, as a consequence, a big chunk of overseas students are just spinning out ... over the years. So, we can change that and that would have a major impact. There are many other areas we could change. I'll just give you one or two to finish, which you may not know about. You've probably heard a lot about 'regional policy' - 'maybe we'll put people in the bush, rather than let them stay in Melbourne or Sydney. Well, currently, there's a program near 30,000 visas strong for state and regional sponsorship. The problem is that these visas do not require people to actually stay in the states or regions that sponsor them. They very quickly move off and they end up in Sydney or Melbourne. Or, consider this, and I'll finish on this note, consider the policy on spouses. [...] what happens in Australia is that you can sponsor a spouse at the age of 18 and you do not have to show that you have a job or an income which will enable you to sustain that spouse. I'm not kidding you. This is the situation. Compare that with Europe. Most countries now, you've got to be at least 22 before you sponsor a spouse, and you've got to prove that you have the funds to support that spouse. I could go on. There is massive potential to bring down the numbers. [...] We have to get the numbers down if we are really coming to grips with Melbourne's crisis of overdevelopment. I'll just leave you with one final thought, and that is that at least public opinion is moving in the right direction. [refers to TAPRIS study] Some 54 % of voters now believe that immigration should be reduced. The polls this year are putting the numbers in the 60%, so the potential is there. May I wish [Sustainable Australia Party] the best in mobilising it."

Notes

[1] Although Bob Birrell's publications in demography are very well known, his qualifications are much greater: Bob Birrell (PhD Princeton – Sociology) was Reader in Sociology and the founding director of the Centre for Population and Urban Research at Monash University. He was the joint editor of the demographic journal People and Place (with Katharine Betts) from 1993 to 2010. His appointment with Monash University finished in 2014. He has been a consultant and advisor to successive Australian governments on immigration policy, most recently as part of Coalition Government’s Evaluation of the General Skilled Migration Categories, published in 2006. His research covers Australian history (A Nation of Our Own – Longman 2005), Australian education policy, urban affairs and immigration practice and policy. His most recent international publications include, ‘Media Effects and Immigration Policy in Australia,’ in Gary Freeman, et al., Eds, Immigration and Public Opinion in Liberal Democracies, Routledge, 2013 and ‘Migration: the Australian experience,’ in Sasha Bangalay and Delphine Nakache, Eds, Immigration Regulation in Federal States, Springer, 2014.

The media froth and bubble over recent asylum seekers arriving by boat near Ashmore Reef mid ocean between Timor and the west Kimberley coast pales in comparison with the daily arrivals at Kingsford Smith Airport in the middle of Sydney.

The Australian newspaper on 2nd November 2009, tallied the total number of Christmas Island detainees at 1165.
Given the genocidal situation caused to the Tamils in Sri Lanka, that number is miniscule to what it could be.

Australia stood back while the Tamils were being slaughtered, when it could have as a joint member of the Commonwealth, like Sri Lanka , got involved in the humanitarian crisis there years ago. What is the point of having a Commonwealth of Nations when at time sof crisis with one of its members, the others turn a bilind eye. Regional Indian Ocean members Australia, Bangladesh, India, Maldives, Mauritius, Pakistan, Seychelles and Singapore - what did they do to help Sri Lanka resolve the Tamil conflict by diplomacy? Nothing? Sat back and turned a blind eye to Rajapaksa's Sinhalese government inflicting genocide on ethnic Tamils?

Now, Australia claims it has an asylum seeker problem, mainly from Sri Lanka, but also from Afghanistan and Iraq.
Pull the other one! According to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees [UNHCR] in March 2009, estimates of the number of asylum seekers in industrialised countries increased by 12 per cent in 2008 to 383,000. In 2007 the figure was 341,000. Of those, just 4,750 people sought asylum in Australia in 2008, compared to 3,980 people in 2007. Now we have just 1165 on Christmas Island, or 0.3% of the global asylum problem.

I agree with the Australian Human Rights Commission that Australia has obligations to protect the human rights of all asylum seekers and refugees who arrive in Australia, regardless of how or where they arrive, and whether they arrive with or without a visa." Refugees in this small number don't even show on the radar of Australia's immigration problem. If the number was up about 5000 a year the issue would deserve closer scrutiny and policy review.

It is about time the Australian media frenzy over asylum seekers was exposed for what it is - racist incitement!

Whereas in fact, the Australian Bureau of Statistics [ABS] has confirmed net migration into Australia for 2008-09 was 283,300. That is 776 new immigrants per day and most arrive into Sydney by plane. This is where the media should have their cameras - at Kingsford Smith Airport's International Arrivals gate on the ground floor. Again the issue has nothing to do with race, ethnicity or difference, but simply the sheer numbers arriving by the plane load daily.

This time last year, in December 2008, "the estimated population for Australia was 21.64 million - this represented an annual increase of 406 100 people (comprising the excess of births over deaths plus net overseas migration) and a population growth rate of 1.91 percent. This population growth rate was the highest since 1988."

Australia's Migration Programme

Why so high? Well, successive Liberal and Labor governments have persisted with a 'Migration Programme'. The planning level under the Migration Programme for 2009–10 is 168 700. It was originally going to be 190,300, but was adjusted down due to the Global Financial Crisis. 64% of that programme focuses on what the government calls 'The Skill Stream'

This Australian Government Skills Stream is killing off Australian jobs. It needs to be scrapped immediately. A skills audit needs to be conducted across Australian industry and the results channelled into the education and training sector to deliver appropriately skilled Australians into these skill shortfall areas. If there is a time lag, let's learn from why education has failed to deliver and fix the disconnnect.

Compare the 'Skill Stream' of 2007-08 to what it was in 1997-98:
'PERMANENT VISA OUTCOMES: 1997-98 to 2007-08'

So instead of the government investing in education and training to skill up Australians to meet skills needs, it invites immigrants to fill the skills shortages. It's a form of scab labour. What happened to Rudd & Gillard's 'Education Revolution'?

The Flood of Overseas Students

The Skilled– Overseas Student visa (permanent residence) is effectively an invitation to overseas students to come to Australia replacing local students in education and then displace local Australians in the workplace.
Since, the 1990s, Australian governments have deliberately reduced university funding. This has forced universities to seek alternative funding sources, most notably from overseas students required to pay full-tuition. Consequently, there has been a flood of overseas students driven both by education demand and massive international promotion by all Australian universities to the target countries. Not surprisingly, Australia has seen a considerable growth in the number of overseas students.

Way back in 1996, Ian Dobson from Monash University in his paper 'Overseas Students in Australian Higher Education: Trends to 1996' reported a 153% increase in overseas students in Australian higher education from 21,010 in 1989 to 53,188 in 1996. The Australian newspaper on 26th February 2009 reported the number in 2008 was a staggering 543,898. So on the 1989 base year, this represents a 2589% increase!

In the article 'Overseas student enrolments in Australia at record high' Federal Education Minister, Julia Gillard was happy with what's seen as 'international education' contributing $14.2 billion to Australia's economy in 2007-08, making it Australia's third-largest export behind coal and iron ore and "the rise in student enrolments from Asia - up 21.5 per cent - was recognition of Australia's ongoing relationship with its Asian neighbours and the strong awareness of Australia as a quality education destination."

Australia's Unemployment

Then we read today, the ABS announced Australia's Unemployment rate (seasonally adjusted) for November 2009 was 5.7%. This translates to 659,400 Australians that are unemployed.

People Dumping

Immigration is importing people and when it is on such a massive scale it is 'people dumping' just like import dumping of imported products on local markets. Australia needs to recognise, that it has local values to protect. Anti-dumping duties on low cost imports are imposed to fair up the pricing to protect local industries. In respect to Australian people and local jobs, displacing locals for overseas skilled labour is 'people dumping'.

I am convinced that Kevin Rudd is anti-Australian.