Letter

In response to Australia’s immigration 'debate' is rhetoric, not policy

Voters know perfectly well the duopoly will never allow low migration

There not being a single useful number in Peter Hughes’ immigration snow-job, let me try to give him a hand. Big Australia means net-migration averaging in the 200,000s, which has only happened after 2005. Mass migration, no matter how much SA Liberal Senator McLachlan may shudder, means the 400,000s. As per Albanese Labor.

Normal or historical net-migration is 80,000, give or take. In every reliable poll during or since COVID, voters (remember them, Peter?) want lower or much lower immigration than what they now have.

Voters know perfectly well the duopoly will never allow low migration. That’s why the One Nation vote is running at 18 per cent. When Peter loftily calls for an “immigration debate”, that always means the upper orders imposing big or mass migration. It never means the lower orders being granted the opposite.

— Stephen Saunders from O'Connor