Pauline Hanson’s sustained campaign of alarmist rhetoric about immigration has once again returned to the centre of public debate, and it deserves a careful and sober rebuttal. Her recent social media posts and speeches characterise immigration as an existential threat to Australia’s economy, social cohesion, housing stock, and even electoral integrity. She warns of “mass immigration” that she says is breaking the country, paints migrants as the primary cause of soaring rents, strained hospitals and schools, and accuses the federal government of deliberately using migration as a “political weapon” to import votes. She argues for drastic measures such as deporting tens of thousands of people, imposing country-specific bans, and driving migration to “net-negative” levels. These claims resonate with those who feel squeezed by economic pressures, yet they rest on a combination of selective facts, historical tropes, and misleading inferences that do not withstand scrutiny.
It is important to be clear at the outset that Australia’s immigration system and the presence of migrants in this country are not, as Hanson portrays them, a conspiracy nor a mechanism designed to undermine the nation. Immigration has been a fundamental part of Australia’s modern economic success and social dynamism, contributing to productivity, demographic sustainability, and cultural vibrancy. Problems such as housing affordability, infrastructure congestion, and public service pressure are real and urgent, but they are the result of policy failures, underinvestment, and market distortions rather than being the inevitable outcome of migration itself. A fact-based critique of current policies is necessary, but it must not be confused with the scape-goating and fear-mongering that too often accompanies the rhetoric of public figures seeking political advantage.
To understand the scale and impact of migration, it is necessary to situate recent changes in a broader demographic and historical context. Australia’s population was estimated at approximately 27.2 million as of mid-2024, and roughly 29.8 per cent of residents were born overseas. These figures reflect a long-standing pattern in which international migrants play a substantial role in the country’s growth. Population growth has averaged around 1.4 per cent annually over the past several decades when measured over long periods, a rate that is neither unprecedented nor uniquely alarming when compared internationally. Assertions that Australia is experiencing the “highest” population growth in the world are misleading, because growth rates are better compared on an international basis using relative measures and because temporary visitor and student flows contribute to gross arrival statistics in ways that can be misinterpreted.
Claims of “record surges” and “floodgates” opening are commonly advanced in populist narratives, but they collapse under careful analysis. Net overseas migration (NOM) is the appropriate measure for understanding permanent additions to the resident population, and recent figures show that NOM, while elevated during the recovery from pandemic border closures, has moderated. For the 2023–24 financial year, net overseas migration was reported to be 446,000, down from 536,000 in the previous year. These are significant net inflows, but they are not the same as gross arrivals, which count short-term visitors, international students, and returning citizens as part of the tally and can therefore inflate perceptions of population pressure. Furthermore, when population growth is viewed in the context of long-term trends and Australia’s need to address an ageing population and skill shortages, the interpretation of these figures changes: migration is a policy instrument that helps maintain the labour force and sustain public services, rather than an accidental deluge imposed on an unwilling public.
It is also relevant to point to the fact that governments set migration policy and quotas, and recent policy changes have sought to steer intake toward skills needed in the economy. The federal government’s planning of the permanent migration program for 2025–26 establishes an intake level intended to respond to labour market needs, with an emphasis on skilled migrants. Temporary migration, including international students and temporary workers, has indeed risen sharply as borders reopened after the pandemic, but that trend has prompted reforms and integrity measures aimed at capping and better managing certain visa categories. Therefore, the characterization of migration as having “no plan” or being deliberately unleashed without controls does not align with how migration policy is actually devised and implemented.
Turning to housing, it is undeniable that Australians face a serious and complex housing affordability crisis. However, attributing that crisis primarily to migration simplifies the problem and obscures key drivers. Housing supply has failed to keep pace with demand for a combination of reasons that include restrictive land-use regulations and zoning at the state and local level, slow and costly approval processes, rising construction costs and labour shortages, the effects of monetary policy shifts on mortgage servicing, and tax settings such as negative gearing and generous capital gains concessions that incentivise investment in existing dwellings rather than new supply. Reports by housing authorities and independent research bodies have emphasised that supply-side constraints are central to escalating prices and rents.
To suggest that reducing migration would in itself restore affordability neglects important feedbacks. The construction sector depends significantly on migrant labour, with migrants filling a substantial share of roles in building trades and related industries. A sudden and large reduction in migration could exacerbate labour shortages in construction, slowing the delivery of new housing and, paradoxically, worsening supply shortages. Moreover, a narrowly migration-focused diagnosis ignores the fact that owner-occupier downpayments, interest rates, investment motives, and vacancy rates are powerful determinants of price dynamics. Policy responses that would materially alleviate the housing crisis include accelerating approvals for new builds, increasing the supply of social and affordable housing, reforming tax incentives that favour property speculation, and investing in the workforce required to deliver buildings at scale. These are policy levers that address the structural roots of the problem; migration is a contributing factor but not the primary cause.
The portrayal of migration as a “Ponzi scheme” that fraudulently props up GDP while impoverishing native-born Australians is an emotive metaphor that does not withstand economic analysis. Empirical studies and modelling indicate that migration, particularly of skilled workers, can raise productivity and expand the economic pie. In the short and medium term, migrants contribute to labour supply, consumer demand, tax revenues, and entrepreneurial activity. Over the longer term, properly integrated migrants replenish the workforce, helping to support age-related spending on healthcare and aged care that would otherwise fall on a relatively smaller base of workers. Fiscal models that examine the lifetime contributions of migrants have often found that cohorts admitted through skilled streams are net contributors to the public purse over their lifetimes, in part because they tend to enter the labour force at ages where they pay taxes over many productive years.
It is fair to recognise that the net economic effect of migration depends on the composition of migrants, the absorptive capacity of local economies, and public policy choices. An intake biased heavily toward lower-skilled temporary entrants without pathways to integration could lead to different outcomes than a policy that prioritises skills, language acquisition, and regional settlement incentives. Nonetheless, the available evidence does not support the claim that migration is a fraudulent contrivance that benefits only elites while depriving the native-born of jobs and wages. On the contrary, migration has been associated with job creation and with modest or negligible adverse wage effects in the aggregate, while also contributing to entrepreneurship and innovation.
Assertions that migrants are a fiscal burden on hospitals, schools, and welfare services also require nuanced examination. It is true that in the short term, population growth imposes demands on infrastructure and services that require investment. However, migrants in their working years generally pay taxes while consuming fewer age-related services than older cohorts, thereby producing a net fiscal benefit over time. Treasury and independent fiscal modelling frameworks that estimate lifetime fiscal contributions typically find that migrant cohorts admitted through economic streams generate positive net contributions. The key policy challenge is ensuring that infrastructure and service capacity keep pace with growth, which is an issue of planning and funding rather than an argument for excluding migrants wholesale.
One particularly pernicious strand of rhetoric in recent public discourse has been the allegation that governments are deliberately “importing votes” by funnelling migrants into targeted electorates. This is a conspiratorial framing that does not reflect how migration or citizenship processes operate. New citizens and migrants hold a diversity of political views, and there is no credible evidence of systematic government-directed settlement to achieve electoral advantage. Electoral behaviour among migrants is influenced by a range of factors, including socio-economic status, integration experiences, and the natural evolution of political identities over time. The insinuation that migrants are a monolithic voting bloc that can be weaponised by political parties is unsupported by evidence and has the potential to stoke division and xenophobia.
Cultural anxieties invoked in public discourse deserve respectful engagement, as questions about identity and social cohesion are genuine concerns for many citizens. Nonetheless, claims that migrants are eroding Australian values, creating enclaves where the rule of law does not apply, or making neighbourhoods unsafe because of ideological incompatibilities are largely anecdotal and not borne out by systematic evidence. Surveys of social attitudes and research on community cohesion indicate that many Australians view cultural diversity as a strength and that most migrants integrate linguistically and economically over time. While instances of cultural friction can and do occur, they are not representative of the broader migrant experience, nor do they justify a policy of exclusion.
Student migration is another topic that has attracted heated commentary. International students are a significant source of revenue for universities and related sectors, and they contribute appreciably to local economies, particularly in regional centres that depend on student spending and university-linked employment. At the same time, there have been legitimate concerns about exploitative practices, visa compliance, and shadow education or labour markets that need to be addressed through robust integrity measures and enforcement. Cutting student numbers indiscriminately would have economic consequences for universities, employment in education sectors, and regional development. The appropriate response is measured reform rather than wholesale contraction.
Proposed policies such as mass deportations, blanket bans on migrants from certain countries, or reducing migration to “net-negative” levels raise ethical, legal, and practical concerns. Many people who are labelled as “illegal” are in complex, protracted administrative situations that require humane and legally grounded responses rather than summary expulsion. Policies that target countries or ethnic groups cross lines into discrimination and would contravene Australia’s obligations under international law. Moreover, dramatic reductions in migration would have cumulative effects on labour supply, economic growth, and the sustainability of public services that policymakers would need to account for honestly in public debate.
It is also worth emphasising that the current public policy conversation would be better served by prioritising reforms that address the structural failings that underpin many of the challenges cited by critics of migration. These include accelerating the delivery of new social and affordable housing, reforming tax settings that distort the housing market, investing in the construction workforce through training and targeted migration for trades, streamlining planning and approval processes, ensuring adequate funding for hospitals and schools that is responsive to demographic change, and strengthening visa integrity and settlement services to foster upward mobility and social participation among newcomers. Such an agenda recognises that migration can be managed to maximise benefits and minimise strains, and it shifts the focus from blame to problem-solving.
In public discourse it is tempting to offer simple explanations for complex problems, and politicians often deploy emotive language because it mobilises support. However, the stakes are too high for Australia to accept narratives that simplify, mischaracterise, or demonise whole groups of people. A balanced, evidence-driven debate recognises both the legitimate concerns that people have about housing, services, and community cohesion and the demonstrable benefits that migration has brought and continues to bring to the country. It also recognises that policy choices matter. Governments of different political persuasions have presided over periods of higher or lower migration, and the quality of outcomes has depended as much on complementary domestic policies as on numbers alone.
Pauline Hanson’s warnings about “mass immigration” may appeal to fears about change, but they recycle old tropes and selective anecdotes rather than presenting a coherent, evidence-based policy alternative. Australia’s experience in the decades since the 1950s demonstrates that migration has been integral to national development, and that the challenges associated with population growth are manageable with the right mix of planning, investment, and regulation. We should not mistake the complexity of public policy for conspiracy nor permit simplistic narratives to obscure practical solutions.
The proper frame for public debate is therefore one of sober realism: acknowledge the pressures that communities face, identify the policy failures that exacerbate those pressures, and pursue reforms that protect vulnerable Australians and strengthen social cohesion while maintaining the economic dynamism that migrants help to supply. That approach recognises both the humanity of those who choose Australia as their home and the legitimate interests of citizens. Above all, it demands honesty from public figures about what is possible and what trade-offs any policy will entail. To reduce this debate to scaremongering and scapegoating is to abandon the opportunity to craft policies that will make Australia fairer, more prosperous, and more cohesive in the years ahead.
