Australians are too polite to blame migrants for housing shortages, a top population expert said after the Government\u2019s statistics agency published a private poll recording overwhelming support for immigration.<\/p>\n
As a debate rages over the appropriate level of immigration, the Australian Bureau of Statistics this week cited a Mapping Social Cohesion Report, funded by the Scanlon Foundation Research Institute, which reported 71 per cent of people in 2024 supported the proposition that immigrants from different countries strengthen Australia. While high, the figure in 2023 was 78 per cent.<\/p>\n
Bob Birrell, president of The Australian Population Research Institute (TAPRI), said many Australians, including well-established migrants, thought immigration levels were too high, despite what that poll said.<\/p>\n
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By continuing you agree to our Terms<\/a> and Privacy Policy<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cThe poll that the ABS cited, it\u2019s really just probing Australians\u2019 politeness,\u201d he told The Nightly. \u201cMost people are not prepared to say outright that migrants are a problem but when we ask them in our survey whether they are in favour of more diversity or not, the great majority of voters – including most well-established migrants – say they\u2019re opposed to that.<\/p>\n \u201cThe concerns are very evident. Most voters could see the connection between high levels of immigration and housing unaffordability.\u201d<\/p>\n Thousands of people protested in major cities two weeks ago against high immigration. Immigration advocates have argued that some of the criticism is driven by racism and that immigrants fill jobs that Australians won\u2019t do, and bring in capital that drives economic growth.<\/p>\n The ABS noted that \u201ccultural diversity is one of the greatest assets of Australian society\u201d. \u201cOngoing acceptance of multiculturalism and immigrants from a diverse range of countries is a key indicator of cohesion, helping protect our society from social divisions,\u201d it said.<\/p>\n \u2018Intake too high\u2019<\/p>\n Other polls have recorded less support for immigration. A TAPRI poll recorded that 67 per cent of respondents disagreed with the idea that Australia needed to boost immigration \u201cto increase our ethnic and other forms of diversity\u201d.<\/p>\n A Lowy Institute poll in June found 53 per cent believed the number of migrants is too high, compared with 38 per cent who thought it was about right and seven per cent who regarded it as too low.<\/p>\n The fall in support for immigration occurred as net overseas migration fell from a record high of 548,800 in the year to September, 2023, to 340,800 by the end of last year.<\/p>\n The migration intake includes permanent arrivals, such as skilled migrants and the long-term influx, which covers international students.<\/p>\n The Scanlon Foundation survey said those who thought immigration was too high generally supported multiculturalism, with 82 per cent overall supporting the suggestion that migrants are good for the economy.<\/p>\n \u201cGrowing belief that immigration is too high is most strongly related to economic and housing issues, rather than attitudes to diversity, multiculturalism and migrants,\u201d it said. \u201cMost people who think immigration is too high also value the benefits of multiculturalism and the contribution of migrants to Australian society, culture and the economy.\u201d<\/p>\n Housing crisis<\/p>\n A big population influx is making life harder for renters. The national vacancy rate remained tight at 1.2 per cent in August, SQM Research data showed.<\/p>\n While the Federal Government collects more income tax revenue from the influx of skilled migrants, State governments are responsible for housing policy.<\/p>\n In NSW today the Government introduced changes to planning rules to fast-track new housing and override local councils.<\/p>\n \u201cWe lose twice as many young people as we gain,\u201d Premier Chris Minns said. \u201cWe\u2019re now losing our best and our brightest young people. The ones we want to have join the New South Wales public education system, become police officers, start their own businesses, become entrepreneurs.\u201d<\/p>\n NSW is required to build 377,000 homes over the five years to June 2029 under a National Housing Accord plan for 1.2 million new homes.<\/p>\n Governments from both sides of politics have been increasingly relying on the working-age population for income taxes with fertility levels continuing to fall in recent decades, leading to bigger intakes of skilled migrants.<\/p>\n Personal income taxes make up the majority of Commonwealth revenue with Treasury\u2019s Budget paper expecting $349.7 billion to be raised in 2025-26 from taxing individuals, from the $676.1 billion pool of taxation receipts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Australians are too polite to blame migrants for housing shortages, a top population expert said after the Government\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":150357,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44,84],"class_list":["post-150356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news","tag-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=150356"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/150356\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/150357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=150356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=150356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=150356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}