The fortress Australia spectre returns

Are we returning to a Fortress Australia mentality?

Some of Australia’s best thinkers fear that we are.

The costs are real.

You will, for example, pay more to build your new house, as a result of it.

And an isolationist mentality would seriously damage Australia’s reputation, internationally.

There are clear overtones of Fortress Australia both in Julia Gillard’s talk of a “sustainable” Australian population in future and the Coalition’s promise to cap immigration at 170,000 a year.

The two major parties both present their policies as reasonable responses to Australia’s present circumstances.

However the nation’s university dons, builders and farmers are all worried by what they are saying.

You should be too.

Like mining, tertiary education is one of Australia’s most successful industries.

But it says it is now faced with “a perfect storm” – and that the population debate is part of  its troubles.

Professor Peter Coaldrake, who chairs Universities Australia, says this country has been “nourished” by a flow of international students,  from the times of the old Colombo Plan.

“This has enabled Australia to establish enduring links and goodwill, connect with the world and enhance our reputation, especially in the Asia Pacific region,” he says.

That says nothing of the money that the tertiary education industry brings to Australia – and the high paying jobs it creates, either.

There have been problems, of course, including recent violence against Indian students in Australia. So Australia is being watched, very closely, at present.

Professor Coaldrake warns that immigration policy must not  be allowed to create a “fortress Australia” mentality, in this country.

Dr Harley Dale, of the Housing Industry Association, and Brett Heffernan of the National Farmers’ Federation have also been vocal on this subject.

Dr Dale says a new survey, which his association produced with Austral Bricks, showed that Australia is short of skilled workers in 8 of its 13 skilled building trades.

This is particularly serious, as the industry is already falling well short of existing demand for new houses.

Those shortages, of course, also mean that builders – and home buyers – will have to pay more to get the skilled workers they still need.

The usually conservative National Farmers’ Federation is worried, too.

It sees a labour shortage, of some 100,000 people, developing in rural areas, over the next five years.

Mr Heffernan says a mandatory cap “gives rise to little flexibility in meeting emerging business needs.”

These warnings, from industry leaders, might well prompt Australians to ask themselves , too, whether the current hysteria over the 4,000 or so boat people, wbo arrive each year, is justified.

Like other immigrants, in the past, refugees have made significant contributions to Australian life.  They could do so, in future, too.