Stop Population Growth Now
Sunday, April 1, 2012
Liveable cities
Sunday, August 1, 2010
Mayo Campaign
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
skill shortages
Wouldn't it be great if rising demand on the health system led to an automatic increase in the health budget? Wouldn't it be great if an increase in demand for peak-hour trains led directly to governments providing more of them? Wouldn't it be great if governments responded to citizens need for services in the same way they respond to employers demands for more immigration.
Australia has, we are told, a skills shortage. Presumably developing countries have much better education systems than ours as they, it seems, have a skills surplus. Does it seem a little bit weird that so many people from the rest of the world want to come to Australia for an education but, at the same time, so many Australian employers would prefer to employ people with skills obtained overseas?
Does it seem strange that developing countries are better able to train doctors than a country like Australia? This does not mean that doctors from other countries should not be free to come to Australia if they wish to, but the idea that we have a shortage of doctors and other countries have a surplus is just absurd. The reality is that Australian governments have decided it is cheaper to let other countries invest in training and for us to poach them.
There is another way to describe a skills shortage. It's a bit old fashioned but it is time someone dug up the old chestnut. A skills shortage can also be called a pay shortage. When demand for waterfront properties rises so too does the price. When demand for hotels increases during school holidays so too does the price. But when demand for skilled labour rises don't mention the price of that labour.
There are, of course, exceptions to this rule. High paid executives, for example, have had to suffer from quite a bit of wage inflation in recent years. Their talents are, we are told, in short supply. And who can forget the mining boom in which workers' pay has risen steadily - but you don't hear many people arguing that high wages have killed the mining boom. On the contrary, high wages are the main benefit Australians are said to have received from the boom.
Employers will no doubt be appalled at the suggestion that the response to the 'skills shortage' might be for them to pay higher wages or, god forbid, invest in some training of their own. "It will cause inflation," they will say, or "it will make us uncompetitive". There is of course something they won't say: "it will reduce my profits".
Profits have been rising steadily in Australia for decades. Indeed, the share of GDP that goes to corporate profits has risen from 16 per cent to 24 per cent since the mid 1970s. At the same time, the share of national income going into the pockets of employees has fallen from 58 per cent to 48 per cent.
The incessant calls for an increase in skilled migration have drowned out genuine debate about the causes of any so-called 'skills shortages' and the range of policy options available to address them. Employers could do what they used to do and invest directly in the training of young apprentices. Governments could once again employ and train tens of thousands of apprentices themselves and then release them into the labour market. Or higher wages for skills that are in short supply could be used to encourage more young people to invest their own time and money in acquiring the skills that are paying a high return.
But rather than have a genuine debate about whether industry or government could be doing more to invest in the training of our young we are simply told there is no alternative but to import those skills from overseas. Rather than have a debate about whether the wages we pay for aged care workers and nurses is high enough we are simply told that it would be uncompetitive to pay them more.
Australia is a country of immigrants. We have always been, and should always be open to new citizens. We should be particularly welcoming of those who seek to enter our country because they have been forced to flee their own. But support for openness to immigration should not come at the price of having to remain silent about the size of our population.
Unlike the demands for more immigration from big business, Australian governments, state and federal, have found it easy to resist the demands for more hospitals, more nursing homes and more public transport.
Big business loves rapid population growth for the simple reason that they profit from having more potential customers. Governments seem to love rapid population growth because they benefit from having more taxpayers. But neither big business nor government wants to invest in the essential infrastructure that all those extra customers and taxpayers require. While the 'benefits' of a big population accrue in the form of profits and budget surpluses, the costs are borne by those stuck waiting in traffic, waiting for a hospital bed or waiting for a seat on the train.
The fans of rapid population growth are effectively saying that if lots of people come then we can build the infrastructure after they get here. I would take them more seriously if they said that they were so keen to have more people come that they were willing to build the infrastructure first.
Dr Richard Denniss is Executive Director of The Australia Institute, a Canberra-based think tank.
food security
Could Australia lose control of its food resources?
Australian Broadcasting Corporation
Broadcast: 26/07/2010
Reporter: Andrew Robertson
There are fears that
Transcript
TICKY FULLERTON, PRESENTER:
It's something which we take for granted, but there are those who believe that as the world's population increases,
Already foreign interests are increasingly looking to
As part of a multimedia special involving ABC's News Online and Radio National's Background Briefing, Andrew Robertson has prepared this report.
ANDREW ROBERTSON, REPORTER: In a country as steeped in farming as
JULIAN CRIBB, UNI. OF TECHNOLOGY,
ANDREW ROBERTSON: In his new book, The Coming Famine, Professor Cribb paints a bleak future of a planet where food is in very short supply. The world's population is tipped to hit nine billion by 2050 and 11 billion just 10 years later.
Food production will need to double, but many countries will be left behind, particularly those like
JULIAN CRIBB: Well I once asked that question to some Chinese academics, I asked them what the carrying capacity of
ANDREW ROBERTSON: According to Professor Cribb this shortage of food is going to have serious implications for countries like
JULIAN CRIBB:
ANDREW ROBERTSON: The evidence suggests that process is already underway. Just this month, Singapore-based Wilmar outbid
An increasing number of prime Australian farms are being purchased by overseas companies. For example,
The Packer family has sold 17 properties to a British private equity firm. The American pastoral giant Westchester has played $40 million for properties at properties in Moree in
Bill Heffernan is the chairman of the Senate inquiry into food production. He shares Professor Julian Cribb's concerns about the surge in foreign investment in Australian agricultural assets.
BILL HEFFERNAN, CHAIRMAN, INQUIRY INTO FOOD PRODUCTION: We're asleep in Australia to the fact that a lot of places round the world such as China, India and the Arab states are looking at where they're gonna be in 40 or 50 years' time and they're making provision now for their food task in the future.
ANDREW ROBERTSON: Which according to Bill Heffernan eventually could see Australian farmers becoming tenants in their own country.
BILL HEFFERNAN: Because we are an attractive destination for safe capital investment, we will lose control of our destiny to outsiders and the worst of that will be government outsiders.
ANDREW ROBERTSON: A look at the Tasmanian dairy industry provides some salutary insights.
JIM HURSEY, DAIRY FARMER: It's actually costing us to go to work. We're actually going to work, doing our job and at the end of the day, we're getting a bill for doing our job! How many people do you know that do that? No one.
ANDREW ROBERTSON: In the Apple Isle, dairy farmers have had enough. Their industry is dominated by two foreign-owned companies -
GLENYS FURZE, DAIRY FARMER: We've been milking 25 years and our farm is really our super fund, like a lotta farmers. And we're just seeing that going down the drain.
ANDREW ROBERTSON: For Bill Heffernan, it's a classic case of how Australians can be the big losers when foreign investment is allowed to go unchecked.
BILL HEFFERNAN: I chaired the milk inquiry in
ANDREW ROBERTSON: The irony is that although foreign investment has contributed to the plight of Tasmanian dairy farmers, for many of them, foreign investment could also be the only hope of escape.
With no Australian buyers coming forward for their farms, estate agents are hawking them overseas. One agent alone has 40 farms she's trying to sell in
GLENYS FURZE: No-one wants to see our farms sold out to another country. There's not one of us wanna see that. But what do we do? Do we sit back with our hands tied and go broke and lose everything?
ANDREW ROBERTSON: The answer for many people connected with agricultural industries is for
TICKY FULLERTON: And in the second part of our investigation tomorrow night, we'll be examining the New Zealand model, which could provide the answer to this growing problem.
For more detailed coverage on the battle for control of Australian farmland, you can visit ABC News Online at abc.net.au/news
Monday, July 26, 2010
Population and Farming Coalition to Challenge in Mayo
A meeting of Mayo electors unanimously agreed to nominate Bill Spragg as the independent candidate for Mayo to provide electors an opportunity to register their concern about population growth and food security.
“The revised population policy announced by Prime Minister Gillard spells disaster for Mount Barker. “ said Bill Spragg.
“Essentially that policy falls into line with both the Greens and the Coalition in arguing that the real concern with population growth is the provision of adequate infrastructure.”
“There is not one party that has a coherent policy on food security as evidenced by the decision to allow the importation of Chinese Apples and Pears and thus threaten the viability of Adelaide Hills Growers.
“We are witnessing the product of over thirty years of neglect – Paul Keating argued that he aimed to allow cheap imports to give urban dwellers access to a wide range of cheap consumer items.
“This policy has continued unabated under both the Liberal and the Rudd/Gillard Labor government.
“It is important not just to reserve land for agriculture but to ensure that the opportunity for farmers to make a living is not put in jeopardy by government policies.
The voters in Mayo will have a unique opportunity to send an unambiguous message to both the Labor and Liberal Party. They are in effect invited to participate in a referendum on population growth and food security. By voting 1 Bills Spragg and then allocating their second preference to either Labor or Liberal they will be sending a powerful message to both the Coalition and Labor.
Written and Authorised By John Tons Lot 10 Edwards Hill Rd Lenswood 5240
Friday, July 23, 2010
population SA
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
Hanson and migration
- A big Australia is not a good thing
- Stopping or reducing migration is not a good thing
- Filling up regional centres (ie anywhere other than the East Coast conurbations) is a good thing.
- Some regional centres (by no means all) can do with a greater population but perhaps it is time to make hard decisions. Which communities are genuinely viable? If they are potentially viable then there is the need to develop programmes that encourage internal migration.
- We need to bury the idea that stopping migration is necessarily racist. Hanson was not opposed to migration but opposed to the sort of people who were coming in. Until we have some real idea of how many people can live on this continent we should be calling a halt to all migration other than asylum seekers.
- Not one of the parties has joined the dots between depletion of natural resources (eg peak oil), climate change, growth economics and population. Good policy demands that we develop a strategy for making the transition to a low carbon , renewable economy. That strategy will dictate what sort of population numbers are genuinely sustainable.