Let’s play the ‘5million population without mentioning immigration’ game…
New Zealand population hits 5 million
Estimates released today showed that on 31 March, the nation numbered 5,002,100 people.
Stats NZ said the national population estimates give the best measure between census dates of the population that usually lives in Aotearoa.
“The latest estimated resident population is based on the 2013 Census usually resident population count, updated for residents missed or counted more than once by the census (net census undercount); residents temporarily overseas on census night; and births, deaths, and net migration between census night and the date of the estimate,” Stats NZ said.
Speaking at her weekly post-Cabinet media briefing, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said the population could be expected to grow further.
“It’s a milestone for us as a nation, and we’ve gotten there a little more quickly than in the past. I think all New Zealanders would be of a view that yes, as a nation we will continue to grow but also that as we grow we want to look after our land, we look after our environment, we look after our people.”
…the post-pandemic world with closed borders forces changes upon us.
In 2018 we had 129 000 migrants for a population of almost 5 million.
Australia with 24 and a half million, allows in 190 000.
You can see the immediate difference when comparing NZ with Australia.
On top of that we have over 300 000 international students and workers with temporary work visas who have been obscenely exploited by a de-unionised job market and additional to that, we had almost 4 million tourists visiting us each year.
Meanwhile more of our assets and land are being owned by overseas interests.
It is no wonder that our social and physical infrastructure is groaning under unsustainable gridlock while creating political friction.
We need to urgently rethink tourism & immigration and the closed borders of a post pandemic world forces us to do that.
Rethink Tourism:
Domestic Tourism
Watching exclusive overpriced NZ Tourism having to beg actual kiwis to visit them at massively discounted prices is wondrous isn’t it? Some of our most spectacular places now affordable for the foreseeable future AND our roads free from hyper tourism too?
Thanks Covid19!
We should look at an extra couple of holidays each year to elongate our long weekends, but the tourism business must change their price gouging to entice Kiwi’s along for the long weekend experience and we should culturally look to celebrate the Kiwi Long Weekend.
Boutique Tourism
One of the good things about the tourism reset is that we must move from hyper tourism to boutique tourism.
With our borders set to remain closed until a vaccine is available, hyper tourism is dead and we should all cheer that death.
The spin that the tourism dollar trickles down to the rest of us seems like a pretty cheap price to pay if it means we all get to have our roads and traffic flow back.
We must also add to the tourism industry the obscene amount of pollution air travel generates. In a rapidly warming planet, these green house gas emissions can not be tolerated, so hyper tourism must die for the planet to survive.
That doesn’t mean we should simply dump tourism as an industry altogether, that would be economic suicide, but we must for once price the bloody experience properly.
If you want to visit a plague free vacation destination then you pay for it.
No more discount flights with the dregs of the holidaying experience landing on our shores to freedom camp crap all over our nation.
If you want to visit plague free NZ, you have to pay for the 14 day mandatory quarantine stay and accept ongoing track trace measures while in New Zealand.
We should be resetting the International Tourism experience infrastructure now so that we have the hotels to house tourists quarantining here for their mandatory 14 days before moving through to their holiday.
We need to move away from hyper tourism to boutique tourism and appropriately price that experience.
What is the price for a plague free holiday? Ask anyone in Paris, New York or London.
Rethink immigration:
Migrant Worker Amnesty
We can’t entice migrant workers here, have them exploited by unscrupulous bosses and then tell them to piss off back home. That is cruel and nasty. We should offer an immediate amnesty to all migrant workers in NZ to become permanent residents BUT right after that amnesty, we must close all immigration until a vaccine is widely available. Employers will need to use the existing work force here if they want to expand, this would end the bullshit games of companies claiming no NZer wants to be a burger king manager or booze seller so we need to import those workers. You either pay proper wages to attract someone to your job or you don’t get an employee.
High Tech Migration
Seeing as most of the planet will shut down and stay shut down to international tourism until a vaccine is available, you will only be focused on high end tourism who can afford the 2 weeks, backpackers and freedom campers are gone. We must also be open to tech companies wanting to relocate their head offices here so that people can live openly in a plague free environment which will quickly become our international selling point.
Homecoming
We also need to be prepared for a mass homecoming of the Kiwi diaspora who are feeling the pinch in Australia and Europe, who are looking at NZs distance as its saving grace now. We should reach out to them and say ‘there’s never been a better time to return Home’ campaigns and bring their expertise and skill sets back to NZ to help generate the next wave of Kiwi entrepreneurs we require to kick start the economy again in the new realty.
There are enormous structural changes coming our way in a post pandemic world and we need to see ourselves as one of the life boats on a climate crisis planet. Tourism and immigration are two areas we need to urgently reform so that when external shocks occur, we are flexible enough to sustain them.
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…and foreign residents have voting rights… absolute madness… crash the housing market, or steel for civil war… ban Australians, Singaporeans and foreign residents from purchasing residential accommodation… No Zealand is sleepwalking into a nightmare future, but the propertied class refuse to see it…
+100%
Agreed only citizens should be able to vote or own a house.
Maybe allow residents to do so as long as they become citizens within a reasonable timeframe. Those that try and use that loop hole to rort the system tax them on ALL gain at 100%. i.e. make it not worth trying to rort the system.
What is this tax loophole for residents you speak of?
Ah Castro. Good to see you back on track.
Only citizens voting.
Only citizens with continuous residency can buy homes and to keep them family must occupy them.
Polytechs revitalised and training of young Kiwis be intergrated within college programs and beyond in a seamless procedure involving a student allowance beyond year 12 or 13. Include solo mums or dads.
We don’t need and cannot afford immigrant labour
NZ should cap its population numbers and stablise its infrastructural needs. Degrowth will be necessary but that should not mean less for the lower and middle income sector.
Mostly agree except there should be no residency for temp work visas it’s why they are temp visas and we don’t want an instant 300 000 more low skilled people with mass unemployment looming.
Hint: if your policy matches up with the wants of exploitative employers, it’s not a good thing for workers.
Nothing to disagree with here. All good stuff.
Good points Martyn. I like to see NZ allow regulated and therefore reduced freedom camping. Like minimum size rental campers starting at Transit Van size going up with proper bathroom fitout and harsh penalties for neglecting black and grey water disposal. Station wagons/SUV banned (unless they’re local, ha ha)
Touring NZ burns up fuel so is an unnecessary unproductive and destructive way to get kicks.
We need to cut right back on vehicle use, not bring in planes full of wasters to use up our environmental assets such as clean air, natural resources, local facilities and create unnecessary demand.
Lockdown should have been a learning experience pointing the direction to us reorganising our local economies for locals.
Pretty much in full agreement.
The whole system of voting rights needs to be reviewed as others have suggested.
Personally, I have no problem with residents voting AFTER they’ve been here for a couple of election cycles, and have therefore shown a commitment.
Nor would I have any problem as a NZ citizen being deprived of the ability to vote in NZ if I lived (resided) in another country for more than a couple of election cycles, though I would expect to be able to vote after a couple of cycles (assuming it claimed to be a democracy).
Buying voting rights, or sleazily obtaining them for personal gain is not on
I do have a big problem with citiizenship and residency being sold (such as with Mr Thiel). with passports being collected or residency endorsed as though they were merely just another commodity or collectable.
If the voting system is sorted out (such as above) – the issue of dual/triple/quadruple citizenship will eventually take care of itself
Mostly agree, but I have some difficulty with the tourism pieces whereby on one hand you welcome the reduced prices for kiwis and on the other ask for higher wealth tourists who will enable prices to be driven up.
Why not ask why DOC camping grounds that just a few years ago were $6 per night for a basic campground are now $15.
This is pushing families with say 4 kids away from that cheap camping holiday as it now costs them as much as $90 per night depending on the age of the kids. Multiply that by a 14 day summer break and you are talking quite serious money.
And the prices drive freedom campers into the free alternative.
We should let all prices and businesses crash until they fall to levels ordinary kiwis can afford. And only let in immigrants with an average net wealth equivalent to the average kiwi.
And ban foreign investment of critical areas such as housing and primary industries.
Of course the banks will fail but nationalise them as they do and that will pay for most of the losses long term and keep capital in NZ and enable a faster recovery.
The biggest boost to domestic tourism would come from staggering the summer holiday break over 3 months so there is no 2 week mad panic and price gouging and sensible sustainable rates for all.
A lot of good points. Especially the banks that are an absolute rort and IMHO keep NZ as a ‘debt slave colony’.
Another good comment, – keep it coming.
The use of national parks and various state owned bush areas was absolutely free with huts being mostly built by Tramping clubs and NZ Forest service where the needed part time shelter.
Now we have a madness of large groups of tourists and facilities to provide gas for cooking or they would denude areas of trees.
Wildlife has not benefited and now giardia pervades out previously clean bush streams.
We don’t need all that crap.
The business’s you want to crash are owned by NZ’s who have got off their backside and taken a punt. Their workers are usually Kiwi as well. They buy goods from NZ firms and so the money goes round and as they do tax is paid which pays for the hospital and schools etc.
We are lucky we have strong banks in NZ as they can help,support us . Why do you think even the government uses one of them and not Kiwibank.
Have you tried to do staff rosters over Xmas . If the holiday period was extended it would create a huge drop in productivity which would lead to staff lay offs and then they could holiday all they wanted while existing on the benefit.
Its not a matter of wanting business to crash but those businesses are subsidised by the environment and Kiwi families.
The true overall cost is far beyond money extracted from the activity.
The so called “strong” banks extract billions out of Kiwis each year for off shore share holders. Banks are the biggest parasites we have making money out of fresh air, but extracting that wealth from Kiwis and NZ.
We can’t entice migrant workers here, have them exploited by unscrupulous bosses and then tell them to piss off back home….
The migrants coming here are totally in a symbiotic relationship with the exploiters! They they become the exploiters…
Does this guy really sound like an exploited person???
This is the type of migrant we welcome – Lovepreet Brar arrived in New Zealand from the Punjab on 13 November 2010, less than a month after his 18th birthday. He enrolled in a management diploma at ICL Graduate Business School for 1 one year diploma.
The main attraction was what came with the education: the opportunity to work while studying, and a path to residency on the other side.
Brar had one singular objective through all this: New Zealand residency. To become eligible he needed to tick a number of boxes, including English proficiency, a tertiary qualification, and a level of income – as well as a managerial title. So when his former boss at Layaway Depot contacted him to ask why he’d left, he levelled with him about what he needed for his ultimate goal. By the week’s end Brar was a store manager at Layaway Depot Otāhuhu.
“I applied for my residency and I got my residency sorted in three months.”
After a few years he got a job AA at Meadowlands in east Auckland and was the go-between for applicants willing to pay bribes to corrupt testing officers.
He liked the work, and his colleagues. “I was the only Indian guy there,” he says, “but there were testing officers too.” They were older and employed by Vehicle Testing NZ (VTNZ), but worked out of the AA offices and shared staff facilities. Brar became friendly with a pair of testing officers, Vinesh Kumar and Mohammed Feroz, often having lunch with them.
One day he pulled into work when he saw a friend outside the office. The friend told him he’d just passed his driver licensing test, and Brar congratulated him on the achievement.
“Bro, do you know it’s so easy to get a licence here?” his friend asked. “I paid $80 to the testing officer and he just gave me a licence – even though I did so many mistakes.”
The scheme Brar had stumbled upon was run by Kumar and Feroz, who would pass those who had failed their tests in exchange for bribes. The pair suggested Brar join them as a sales funnel. Brar says he agonised, but was eventually persuaded. “I know it was my fault. I should not have been convinced, I should not have got involved,” he says. “It was the biggest mistake of my life.”
“It was a mistake that made him a lot of money. In less than two years he received over $56,000 into his bank accounts, spread over 107 transactions. He says the amount he retained was less, but it’s also true that many applicants paid in cash. Police are still unsure of either the total number of licences issued, or the amount of money the scheme netted those involved, but a police source close to the investigation believes it was likely more than $100,000.”
https://thespinoff.co.nz/music/02-07-2019/the-extraordinary-story-of-love-brar-the-fraudster-who-became-a-pop-star/
He is now resisting his deportation from NZ costing our country a fortune while he beomes a YouTube sensation, starring in videos that attract millions of clicks and often involve guns, flash cars and women.
“One of his videos, titled Jail, shows Brar at a mansion surrounded by prestigious cars. He has a wound in his right arm but when the female character gives him first aid, armed with a knife, she appears to remove a bullet.
The video has over 8 million views.
Immigration New Zealand has told Stuff that Brar was issued with a deportation notice back in April.
He has since appealed the decision to the Immigration Protection Tribunal.”
https://www.stuff.co.nz/auckland/114283545/bribes-for-driver-licences-deportation-order-issued-for-star-witness-and-youtube-sensation
Seriously too much cool aid being drunk by those that think should give away social housing, welfare, health care and welcome more criminals and exploiters to our shores, wiping out our kids futures for hundreds of thousands, who came on temporary permits that are very clear are temporary.
I for one am sick of future exploiters and those of poor character being welcomed to NZ by the woke…. the migrants make up a sizeable number of the unscrupulous bosses and victimise others, so please, yes, I for one am happy to tell the current and future exploiters to piss off back home.
Child abuser wins right to stay in New Zealand for humanitarian reasons
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/84891031/child-abuser-wins-right-to-stay-in-new-zealand-for-humanitarian-reasons
Child abuse dad avoids deportation on humanitarian grounds to stay with family
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/76059417/
Iain Lees-Galloway chose ‘lazy’ option granting residency to drink-driver – Simon Bridges
https://www.newshub.co.nz/home/politics/2019/10/iain-lees-galloway-chose-lazy-option-granting-residency-to-drink-driver-simon-bridges.html
New resident convicted of sex offending twice, won’t be deported
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11837608
Judge’s difficult sentencing of a former refugee who won’t stop offending
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/111480343/judges-difficult-sentencing-of-a-refugee-who-wont-stop-offending
Rapist wins case to be allowed to stay in NZ
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/327784/rapist-wins-case-to-be-allowed-to-stay-in-nz
These are just the ones being caught! Seriously we are importing in the exploiters and then giving them residency here on the back of the woke stupidity that does not seem to be able to work out that the people doing this stuff are the migrants themselves who NZ woke have welcomed in!
Jailed trafficker committed ‘crime against human dignity’
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/320465/jailed-trafficker-committed-'crime-against-human-dignity‘
Bakery owner to pay back $33,800 illegally deducted from worker’s wages
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/112128450/bakery-owner-to-pay-back-33800-illegally-deducted-from-workers-wages
Sikh temple to pay $100k for breaching employment laws
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/117040153/sikh-temple-to-pay-100k-for-breaching-employment-laws
22 restaurants, 120 staff – and now a $40,000 fine
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12014023
Sushi restaurant owner to pay $30k for exploiting workers
https://www.radionz.co.nz/news/national/321156/sushi-restaurant-owner-to-pay-$30k-for-exploiting-workers
The Big Scam: ‘Marriages for sale’ in alleged visa rort
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/108067804/the-big-scam-marriages-for-sale-in-alleged-visa-rort
Indian restaurant bosses fined for exploitation
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/287183/indian-restaurant-bosses-fined-for-exploitation
Indian businesses ‘sell’ jobs for visas to students
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/336687/indian-businesses-sell-jobs-for-visas-to-students
The Indian women paying for a NZ education with their freedom
https://www.rnz.co.nz/national/programmes/voices/audio/2018636396/the-indian-women-paying-for-a-nz-education-with-their-freedom
Immigration marriage and dowry scams on the rise, says charity
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12123831
Migrant worker speaks out against exploitation at rural Reporoa holiday park
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/118329341/migrant-worker-speaks-out-against-exploitation-at-rural-reporoa-holiday-park
https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/365583/punjabi-singer-gets-home-detention-for-drivers-licences-bribes
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/110581372/obsessive-exboyfriend-rohit-singh-sentenced-to-life-in-prison-for-murder-of-arishma-chand?rm=a
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/72529233/Mandeep-Singh-sentenced-to-life-in-prison-for-central-Auckland-murder
Cigarette smuggling case: Defendants keep names secret to protect children, employees
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/115014183/cigarette-smuggling-case-defendants-keep-names-secret-to-protect-children-employees
Auckland building boss charged with fraud after investigation into illegal labour
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12005146
Lawyers’ fees restrained by police after Auckland drug bust
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11842563
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/82387108/did-fraud-suspect-joanne-harrison-approve-her-own-leave-then-flee-nz
Businessman and the stolen honey: Sheng Sun sentenced over 480kg mānuka heist
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12077932
William Yan AKA Bill Liu to keep NZ citizenship despite money laundering conviction
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11905478
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/business/news/article.cfm?c_id=3&objectid=12011961
Chinese buyers fined $847k after failing to get consent to buy $5m cliff-top Auckland mansion
http://www.raggededgemagazine.com/departments/news/000564.html
Deaf NZ child — ‘a burden on the state’ — is murdered; father charged
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/84891031/Child-abuser-wins-right-to-stay-in-New-Zealand-for-humanitarian-reasons
https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/118004926/family-of-migrant-worker-who-died-on-the-job-seeks-compensation
Cigarette smuggling case: Defendants keep names secret to protect children, employees
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/115014183/cigarette-smuggling-case-defendants-keep-names-secret-to-protect-children-employees
Mother and son arrested for smuggling tobacco into NZ
https://www.stuff.co.nz/national/crime/117400678/mother-and-son-arrested-for-smuggling-tobacco-into-nz
Exclusive: Filipino shipping agent escaped jail time after 225k un-taxed cigarettes found in container she arranged
https://www.tvnz.co.nz/content/tvnz/onenews/story/2019/03/07/hold-filipino-shipping-agent-escapes-jail-time-after-225k-un-tax.html
The answer(s) lie in the hands of what we do, or dont do. Macro v Micro economics. Global forces v Domestic. If we ‘can’ unhitch our trailer from the out of control juggernaut, the global debt machine that owns Crown & government debt, private debt and business & corporate debt.
Figure that one out first and then ‘we’ll’ know what we really can do, otherwise we’re all just piss’n into the wind.
Strict rules and limits are needed for immigration, but when the 5 Mio was announced, Stats NZ and the news-people already spoke of us reaching 6 Mio by 2040. So the system is geared for population growth, and I fear nothing much will change, as NZ’s economy only seems to grow based on population growth. A disaster is looming in the future of this land and its people.
The migrant situation is just an extension of the situation NZ has put itself in when they decided to fuck over the local people in NZ and gift the countries future over to anybody with a bundle of short term cash or some magic beans.
Example, my neighbour is a migrant family with 2 children who have got permanent residency and citizenship in NZ. One is highly skilled in construction and used to earn around $100k in NZ which was probably underpaid even at that time…. well that person has gone overseas now, as the wages and conditions in construction have steadily reduced in NZ so he can earn better money in ASIA than NZ. (He is not Asian by the way, it is nothing to do with race, it is skills and what NZ pays for them).
So another highly skilled worker lost overseas to manage construction for higher wages and left the rest of the family in NZ, who will now be able to access welfare here….
So not only are we losing the skilled Kiwi’s, NZ’s obsession with low wages also loses the skilled migrants as soon as they gain citizenship/permanent residency here ..and the majority of migrants choose to leave their families in NZ to be supported at the same time.
Unless NZ urgently stops the ponzi and low wages in every sector, NZ is soon going to become like The Phillipines with the skilled workers overseas and the family stay in the Phillipines (but in NZ workers don’t have to support their families when they go overseas, as we have a welfare system)…
The point is, they way NZ is using migration to lower wages in NZ, is further driving this country into dysfunction and poverty and losing the very skilled workers they claim to be trying to attract (which is not true anyway because our essential skills worker list only has low wage jobs like chefs and retail workers, labourers making up the majority of the skills ).
It is not migrants vs locals, the entire system is against anybody who wants a decent wage for being experienced and knowing what you are doing, for a decent days work in NZ no matter what race.
Now the unions like unite /woke are giving up on migrants working altogether and just think they should access welfare and cut out the middle job altogether by going on unemployment benefits with temp work contracts.
(And so in 2018 there were 129 000 migrants for a population of almost 5 million. Now at say 18% increase for two years it is more like 180,000 migrants for a population of 5 million and growing with more kids being born, spouses and aged parents on the top of that, not even counting illegal citizens and the rise in people who seem to be using multiple passports so our government doesn’t know if they are in NZ or not aka Sroubek…. ) Australia with 24 and a half million, allows in 190 000. So NZ is literally dumping poverty upon the country.
That is how ridiculous our economy and our immigration and our government and our unions and woke, have become that they want to bring people to NZ to be on welfare while jettisoning anybody with skills and experience out of NZ to work else where.
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