POPULATION STRATEGY – A MISSED OPPORTUNITY

COMMENTS ON SUSTAINABLE POPULATION STRATEGY

POPULATION STRATEGY – A MISSED OPPORTUNITY

The Government’s population strategy represents a missed opportunity to put Australia’s population on a sustainable basis and curb our rapid population growth.

The failure to set targets means we are still on our way to Big Australia, with net overseas migration tracking at 180,000 per annum, the number Treasury says will see Australia’s population rise to 36 million by 2050.

I remain concerned that the present rate of population growth – a 60% increase in our population over the next 40 years – will put upward pressure on the cost of housing, electricity, water, food, council rates, and upward pressure on interest rates.

The impact of a 60% increase in Australia’s population on our native wildlife will be catastrophic. Then there is the issue of carbon emissions. The government has promised to cut carbon emissions by 60% over the next 40 years. How are we supposed to cut emissions by 60% if our population is rising by 60% at the same time? It’s pretty hard to reduce your carbon footprint when your keep adding more feet.

I am pleased that the strategy acknowledges the challenges faced by our major cities, such as declining housing affordability and increasing traffic congestion.

I hope that all levels of government – federal, state and local – and all political parties – Labor, Liberal and Greens – will acknowledge the reality of life for people living in the big cities, and abandon plans to grow these cities still bigger. If all levels of government now work together to stabilise the populations of Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane, this strategy will have achieved something worthwhile.

But I continue to be convinced that another 13 million people will not give us a richer country, it will spread our mineral wealth more thinly and give us a poorer one.

Our aim to lift the participation rate and find work for people who are presently on Job Search Allowance or Disability Support Payments would be much more easily realised if we reduced skilled migration to the level of the mid 90s to give us a net overseas migration level of 70,000.

KELVIN THOMSON, MP

Member for Wills

13/5/2011

COMPANY CAR AND DEFENCE CUT BACKS

COMPANY CAR AND DEFENCE CUT BACKS

I welcome reports that the Government intends to introduce a single 20% fringe benefits tax rate for company cars in next Tuesday’s federal budget.

This would mean taxpayers who are given company cars would be in the same position regardless of how many kilometres they drive.

At present cars which are driven more kilometres incur less fringe benefits tax. This is an incentive to drive company cars further, which is not what we want when we’re trying to cut Australia’s carbon emissions.

Changing the Fringe Benefits Tax rules for company cars is something I’ve previously called for on several occasions. It was one of the recommendations of Ken Henry’s review of the tax system.  I’m pleased at these reports which show the Government plans to move to improve the health of both the Budget and the planet.

I also welcome the Defence Minister’s announcement concerning Defence spending cuts. It seems to me that the Howard Government’s 3% real increase every year in Defence expenditure has led to a massive increase in Defence expenditure over time, which has contributed to a culture within Defence which is extravagant, and does not represent the best use of scarce taxpayers’ dollars.

KELVIN THOMSON MP

Member for Wills

Friday 6^th May, 2011

WA LIBERAL GOVERNMENT SQUANDERING RESOURCES BOOM

WA LIBERAL GOVERNMENT SQUANDERING RESOURCES BOOM

Australia’s resources have taken thousands of years to accumulate and are of immense value.  They should not be squandered.

There is no prospect that they will diminish in value in the years ahead, so it seems to me that we do not need to engage in a headlong rush to dig them up and sell them off as fast as possible.  Indeed I think there is a perfectly respectable case for leaving at least some of these resources for our children and grandchildren.

But seeing as we are digging them up and selling them off as fast as possible, we must at least ensure that Australia and Australians are the beneficiaries of this.

I am therefore disappointed to learn, from the Western Australian branch of the Amalgamated Metal Workers Union, that WA Premier Barnett not only allowed most of the engineering and fabrication for the Oakajee project to be done in China, but is now allowing major resources companies to send their work offshore too.

The union writes “While there are jobs up north while our major projects are being  built, most local workshops are empty, apprenticeship numbers are falling and unemployment in places like Kwinana is rising.  And, if our engineers want to help design our major projects, they have to move overseas, leaving our young engineers without senior people to learn from.

Colin Barnett talks a lot about how much our major resources companies are spending in WA, but he is very quiet about how much of this is being spent on creating skilled jobs and apprenticeships for locals.

The legacy from this new resources boom should be a highly trained and highly skilled workforce that can provide engineering and fabrication services to resources projects around the world and work together to create future industries and new jobs here in WA.”

The AMWU has a campaign slogan to go with their concerns – WA jobs from WA Resources. What Can Be Made Here, Should Be Made Here.

The resources boom presents a once in a lifetime opportunity. The WA Government has no business wasting it.

KELVIN THOMSON MP

Member for Wills

Friday 6^th May, 2011

RAPID WORLD POPULATION GROWTH WORRIES UN

RAPID WORLD POPULATION GROWTH WORRIES UN

The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs has released population projections for the year 2100.

They say the world’s population is likely to grow to 10.1 billion by the end of this century.  Much of this increase is likely to come from high-fertility countries, which comprise 39 countries in Africa, nine in Asia, six in Oceania and four in Latin America.

When we bear in mind the fact that it took us the whole of human history until 1900 to reach 1.6 billion people, and we are now likely to reach 10.1 billion by the end of the century, little wonder the UN describes current growth rates as too high.

The director of the Population Division of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Hania Zlotnik, says a 10 billion population has “serious implications” for the ability to provide food, water, energy, education and employment for millions of people in the poorest nations.  Absolutely right, to say nothing of the consequences of poverty and conflict over access to scarce resources – war, terrorism and millions of refugees.

KELVIN THOMSON MP

Member for Wills

Thursday 5^th May, 2011

DON’T DUMP ON AUSTRALIA

DON’T DUMP ON AUSTRALIA

The Australian Workers Union has launched a campaign to raise worker and community awareness about the damage illegal dumping is doing to Australia’s manufacturing industry.

The AWU says there has been dumping of a wide range of “finished” goods competing with Australian producers.  It says products like solar panels, rail track, wind towers, mining infrastructure equipment, steel frames etc are being produced overseas, primarily by China, and dumped on the Australian market.

The AWU has resolved to call on the Federal Government to establish an independent commission to investigate dumping allegations and legislate to enable affected groups and unions to ask for investigations to be undertaken by this body.

The union says that the US and Canada have more transparent laws and regulations on dumping, making it more likely that free trade will improve our living standards rather than lower them.

I support the AWU campaign. I believe national self- sufficiency is important, and I want Australia to continue to have a vibrant manufacturing industry. It is therefore important that our “level playing fields” are genuinely level.

KELVIN THOMSON MP

Member for Wills

Thursday 5^th May, 2011

VICTORIAN GOVERNMENT SHOULD SUPPORT LOCAL RESIDENTS

VICTORIAN GOVERNMENT SHOULD SUPPORT LOCAL RESIDENTS

The Master Builders Association of Victoria has asked the Victorian Government to create as-of-right development zones where developers would not need Council approval, and development such as dual occupancies, low-rise townhouses, apartments and other medium-density housing would be fast-tracked.

I urge the Victorian Government to reject this try-on.  Residents don’t have enough say in planning issues as it is, and are being forced to live next to buildings they have objected to, and live in increasingly crowded and congested streets and neighbourhoods.

The housing shortage is a consequence of Melbourne’s rapid population growth. If the Master Builders Association really wants to see this problem resolved, they should be advocating for a return of migration to 1990s levels.  Back in 1996 the Victorian Government’s Department of Infrastructure did an extensive report setting out population projections for the state for the next 25 years.  They estimated that Victoria’s population would grow on average by 30,000 – 40,000 per year.

If that had been right, we wouldn’t have a housing problem, but it wasn’t right.  Migration has increased rapidly over the past decade.  Melbourne’s population grew by 79,000 last year – more than twice what the Department was predicting for the whole of Victoria!

The Department predicted Melbourne’s population would be 3.8 million by 2021.  In fact we passed 4 million last year, over 10 years ahead of schedule!

Stopping Melbourne’s growth, not taking away residents’ rights, is the solution to the housing shortage.

KELVIN THOMSON MP

Member for Wills

Thursday 5^th May, 2011

INSTITUTE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS WANTS TO DISMANTLE AUSTRALIA'S BORDERS

INSTITUTE OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS

WANTS TO DISMANTLE AUSTRALIA’S BORDERS

The Institute of Public Affairs faithfully runs out the agenda of big business on all things – relentlessly anti-union, anti-environment, anti-government. Not surprisingly it is a strong supporter of Liberal Party personnel and policies.

The Liberal Party likes to project itself as ‘tough on border protection”.  John Howard famously said “We will decide who comes to this country and the circumstances in which they come”, and even now Opposition spokespeople accuse Labor of being “soft on protecting our borders”.

It was fascinating, therefore, to read Institute of Public Affairs Spokesman Chris Berg suggesting recently that there shouldn’t be any borders at all – that Australia (and other countries) should allow anyone who wants to come to do so.

He said in the modern world “Goods move easily – Money moves easily. That’s all great. But the situation for people is very different. People don’t move around the world easily at all. With its quotas, plodding bureaucracy, and more obviously, all the smuggling, immigration today looks strikingly like the restricted and protectionist global trade of yesterday”.

He is in favour of dismantling immigration controls: “All the same principles which make free trade a win-win apply to free movement of people – large scale immigration allows people to work where they can be most productive”. 

He says “The biggest idea in development no-one has really tried is allowing large scale immigration from the third world to the first”. [Drum opinion,  Chris Berg, 9 March 2011].

It is an astonishingly revealing article. First it explains the paradox that the Liberal Party talks tough about border controls, but in Government runs high migration programs – it is because their big business supporters insist they run high migration programs.

Second it shows that the Institute of Public Affairs and its business backers have such an extreme hostility to government action that they do not even believe governments should be allowed to stop people coming to countries en masse! Their answer to the refugee and asylum seekers issue is to simply let everyone come.

The electorate will need to be vigilant. Already this idea is influencing policy makers, as can be seen by the large increase in migration over the past decade.  If voters do not actively tell politicians and media that this is unacceptable, then no doubt this is the direction in which we will head.

KELVIN THOMSON MP

Monday 2^nd May, 2011