Michael Pascoe in yesterday’s Crikey is correct to say that immigration is a sometimes difficult topic, but it isn’t so difficult as to justify some of the strained logic displayed in his piece.
Firstly, he gives a run to the “migrants will stop Australia meeting our greenhouse targets” line which is the latest favourite from the minority Hansonite wing of the environment movement. Now, if ever there was a global, as opposed to just local, environmental issue, it is greenhouse emissions. I have yet to see a single piece of scientific data suggesting carbon generated by migrants to Australia is more damaging than carbon generated if they had stayed in their home country. Reducing global population growth will certainly help reduce total greenhouse emissions, but it makes no difference which country people are in when they contribute to greenhouse emissions.
Pascoe also seems to suggest it is a bad thing that mechanics can currently earn more doing other jobs, such as truck driving. His logic seems to be that rather than have people switch to a job where they can earn more, we should be keeping migrants out in order to limit the supply of mechanics, enabling the resultant shortage of mechanics to push up their wages — thus saving them from needing to switch jobs. What isn’t explained is the inevitable flow-on effect in the shortage in truck drivers, due to mechanics not switching jobs for the higher pay.
Pascoe gives it away with his comment that there are “good mechanics from third-world nations” happy to come here and work. Quite why it is a bad thing that we have good mechanics coming from “third world nations” isn’t made clear, but I guess the one thing that has changed since the same arguments were run in the “Australia for the white man” days of the 19th (and 20th) century is that people have learned not to be quite so blatant.
The simple face is that the 457 visa program is growing because it is demand driven. If sufficient mechanics could be found from amongst Australia’s current labour force, there would be barely a single employer interested in bringing one from overseas, whether from a “third world” country or elsewhere. If some of that shortage is because local mechanics can earn more money elsewhere, it isn’t solved by blaming or blocking (mostly temporary) migrants from filling the gap.
It is scarcely surprising that as capital and finance have gone global that labor should follow suit. The US economy is to a large extent relying on labor from Mexico and Central America for many of the low paid jobs, and in Europe free movement of labor within the European Union is permitted.
Dear Clive
I have always assumed “PC Crap” is when people refuse to use straight talk if it conflicts with either their own or other people’s sensitivities. I don’t know why that should extend to people being immune from correction or criticism when they use simplistic assertions to attack migration and migrants.
I am sorry you feel it is bullying for me express my opinion and thus feel the need to respond with abuse. It is a simple fact that Hanson’s party often used simplistic assertions regarding the inability of Australia’s environment to handle more people as one of their justifications for opposing migration. For a short period the Democrats official policy also had an anti-migration component using this justification. If you want to extrapolate that fact to a personal accusation of ‘racist xenophobe’ you can, but I didn’t use those words – perhaps you can accuse me of being ‘PC’?
The simple reason why “on average” (and there is an awful lot of variation hidden underneath those averages) “the greenhouse emissions of a person who migrates to Australia are around double those the person would have been responsible for if they had not migrated” is because (a) many of those people come from vastly poorer circumstances and (b) Australians have amongst the most profligate and wasteful lifestyles on the planet when it comes to greenhouse emissions.
I presume no one is seriously arguing we can encourage the rest of the world to adopt a greenhouse target strategy which involves them staying poorer, so we need to be focusing on reducing emissions overall rather than kidding ourselves that where people live at any one time will somehow help. The notion that lifting the drawbridge (now that we’ve come here of course) will help even slightly in sustainably reducing global greenhouse emissions is simply silly.
So we either keep poor people from poor countries living in poverty (an approach which directly correlates with much higher birthrates, it should be noted), or we reduce profligacy amongst people who live in Australia, migrant or not.
Given the current debates around the ETS Green Paper, it seems as a nation we are so wedded to every single aspect of our lifestyles that to even raise the idea that we might to need to engage in air travel less often, or consume less meat and dairy products, is seen as heresy. Blaming migrants is a distraction which helps us avoid focusing on our existing shortcomings, although as my original piece pointed out, it is a time honoured practice (in most countries, not just Australia).
mr hamilton nobody called you a racist. You elected yourself. It is more extreme elements the Jennifer Goldies of this world spring to mind. Pofaced reactions or measured responses are the better way rather than doing your nut as you have here.
Migration and the 457 visas can also be used a political tools. The South Australian Treasurer has just been in the Philippines and has come back and announced 50 000 Philippines will come to SA to fill the ‘skills shortage’. SA has the highest unemployment in the country and ‘true’ unemployment in the North and South is up to 20%. We are loosing industries in car and manufacturing and with our water shortages in the Murraylands even fruit picking is in decline. It appears that it is cheaper to bring labour in than retrain our own unemployed. This SA government is failing in wage negotiations and threatens to import labour. We have abject poverty in our indigenous communities and I am sure many of those young men would love the opportunity to have training for a trade such as auto mechanic. My pov is our governments are just looking OS for solutions before looking in our own back yard, and I am not an advocate for a White Australia, we all know the original Australians are black. If we do have to import labour why not look to our pacific islands who are suffering in poverty. I am sure they can do more than play rugby.
On another note I hope you do not retire from politics your voice for social justice issues is much needed in the world we now live in. ?
Dear Andrew
Some of us will no longer be bullied by your PC crap i.e. that any environmentalist concerned about the impact on greenhouse gas emissions of population growth (including immigration) is a closet Hansonite. It really diminishes you to make that sort of accusation.
You seem unable to understand a very simple fact (demonstrated in an analysis by myself and Hal Turton some years ago). On average, the greenhouse gas emissions of a person who migrates to Australia are around double those the person would have been responsible for if they had not migrated. In other words, migration of people from countries with low per capita emissions to countries with high per capita emissions increases global emissions overall.
This does not mean migration is a bad thing, as there may be other benefits from it. But it is just ignorant to say that migration makes no difference to global emissions.