Tony Burke’s abandoned migration address has all the signs of a government suddenly rattled by the politics of population growth.
The Home Affairs Minister had been expected to stride into the National Press Club on Thursday with a headline-grabbing plan to tighten Australia’s net overseas migration settings.
But by late Tuesday, the speech was pulled, with Labor still unable to land agreement within its own ranks on crucial parts of the package.
The announcement has now been pushed back until the Prime Minister is back from leave and federal Parliament resumes after the winter recess.
That does not look like careful immigration reform. It looks more like policy being assembled under pressure by a government watching voter frustration build, particularly as One Nation gains momentum. Tony, don’t panic!
The political contradiction is hard to miss. Back in April, Burke mocked the Coalition’s approach to immigration, claiming it was “entirely about sending a message to One Nation”.
Now, just four months on, he appears to be moving to the very same beat he once dismissed so confidently.
Scheduling, selling and briefing journalists on a major migration policy speech before the central details were actually settled is not strategy. It is a remarkably public display of political improvisation.
And they are panicking and flip-flopping despite still leading on the two party polling.
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke abruptly cancelled a speech to the National Press Club, scheduled for Thursday
His proposed overhaul is understood to include tighter family visa rules, caps on backpackers and restrictions on the appeal rights of asylum seekers. Above, crowds at Sydney’s Wynyard station
The proposed overhaul could include tighter family visa rules, introduce caps on backpackers and restrictions on the appeal rights of asylum seekers.
These aren’t minor administrative tweaks. They would affect families, legal protections and regional economies. Yet, Labor is like a cat treating the policy like a ball of wool.
Just 48 hours before Burke was due to sell the package to the country, Labor was still fighting over the substance.
So much so that the terrible optics of canning the speech altogether was considered to be the lesser of evils than proceeding in some form.
Pauline Hanson’s surge has turned simmering public anxiety over housing and overloaded services into a lethal political threat to both major parties.
It’s existential for the Coalition, but Labor’s response doesn’t exactly look like a considered reassessment of the national interest.
It looks like a frantic attempt to produce a ‘quick and drastic’ cut to migrant numbers to save a few concerned Labor MPs.
The government’s own budget forecasts already have net overseas migration falling from its 538,000 peak to 245,000 by 2026/27. If that trajectory is real, and not just a fiddled forecast, why the sudden emergency crackdown?
Pauline Hanson can claim credit for forcing the government’s hand on migration. Above with newly appointed Victorian leader Warren Pickering
If it isn’t, why did Labor only discover the crisis and the need to do more when One Nation started cannibalising its primary vote?
The government can’t claim its migration strategy is working as it intended while urgently drafting new measures to slash the numbers in a very different way.
Panic is a terrible basis for policy development. Forcing spouses to wait overseas, while applications stall in an endless backlog, isn’t a ‘fine detail’, as government sources predictably claimed.
Neither is restricting the work and appeal rights of asylum seekers or reducing the supply of backpacker labour to regional businesses.
The Labor government is now caught between the concerns of its base compared with growing community concerns about the impact of high levels of immigration.
Business has skin in the game too.
Then there’s housing. Fewer arrivals might cool rental demand at the margins, but poorly targeted cuts could also deprive the construction sector of migrant tradespeople needed to build more homes.
A serious government balances these trade offs. A frightened government simply yanks whichever lever drops the headline number fastest and hopes for the best.
Labor has wedged itself perfectly here. If Burke eventually delivers a hardline package, he will face resistance from parts of his own backbench, migrant communities and industry.
The Greens won’t shut up about it either. If he waters it down from what was originally due to be announced, One Nation will dismiss it as cosmetic tinkering from a weak government.
Either way, Hanson gets to claim credit for forcing Labor’s hand.
Burke’s cancelled address was grandly titled ‘The work of managing the migration program’. Right now, this government can’t even manage to work up a speech on time.
