If there’s a housing crisis, why won’t the government just lower immigration?

Another pointless department wasting your money.

“Senator RENNICK: With regard to the whole housing fund et cetera, you are planning to build 6,000 houses per year over the next five years, so 30,000 houses. Wouldn’t it be simpler to lower the immigration rather than create a whole new department, not risk the $10 million and give tax incentives to foreign investors? Wouldn’t it just be easier to lower the immigration rate and simplify everything?

Ms Anderson: That’s quite complex because if you lower the immigration rate you will have less workforce to build houses— there is a balance here as well as less labour supply to other important parts of economy.

Senator RENNICK: But 50 per cent of immigration is foreign students. They’re not building houses, they are at university.

Ms Anderson: That’s right. Different segments of the migration intake put pressure on different parts of infrastructure and housing across the country. Students have a different profile to others as well. We need more houses no matter what. The government’s supply-side initiatives are designed to stimulate that action, noting that a lot of these belong to the states and territories. There is a careful balance to be struck around migration not in terms of the benefits that it brings but also the pressure that it brings.”

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Typical bureaucratic bluster.

Rather than just lowering immigration by 10,000 a year which is quite straight forward, the government would rather create a new department, spend $10 billion of your money and give tax breaks to foreigners.

Furthermore if immigrants are contributing to the workforce why do we have a skills shortage given over a million have entered the country in the last two years!

The leadership in this country is hopeless.