The Federal Government is hinting skilled migrants could be forced to live in regional Australia for up to five years before being allowed to move. But some experts have expressed doubts that this plan will relieve congestion in Sydney and Melbourne.
The Federal Government continues to flirt with major population policy changes.
Now, it has indicated skilled migrants could be forced to stay in regional Australia for up to five years before being allowed to move.
It is not saying how many migrants would be affected, nor for how long, but the Government is slowly revealing its policy ahead of the election.
Cities and Population Minister Alan Tudge says the challenge is immense.
"In absolute terms, our growth has never been higher. Our nation is adding a city the size of Canberra every year and the size of Adelaide every 3.5 years."
The Coalition says the booming capital-city populations on the east coast are mostly because of migrants arriving from overseas.
It says it wants to spread out incoming migrants.
Under the Coalition’s newly announced plan, skilled migrants would be directed away from Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Canberra and Perth and forced to live in regional Australia for up to five years.
The Government classifies everything outside of those cities as regional Australia, including Adelaide and Darwin.
"We've got smaller states and some of our regions who are crying out for more workers. Settling even a slightly larger number of new migrants to the smaller states and to the regions can take significant pressure off our big cities."
Prime Minister Scott Morrison is backing the idea, saying "This is about actually trying to support, on the ground, the economic and population policies of local communities. It is about working hand in glove* with those communities and following their lead and backing them on the programs that they have."
But, when he was in opposition in 2010, Mr Morrison told the ABC's Lateline program a similar proposal was fanciful.
"So to hold out some false hope that this problem's going to be solved because a population minister is going to fantastically move people around like has never been done before in our history is, I think, unfair to the Australian people to suggest that that is a realistic option."
Opposition employment spokesman Brendan O'Connor says the new Coalition proposal lacks detail and could worsen unemployment in regional Australia.
He has criticised Mr Morrison over it, saying "He's the thought-bubble boy of Australian parliament. So the idea that you would direct people coming through the immigration processes to regions where there's already high unemployment could compound a problem, not make it better."
Government statistics show, of the 163,000 migrants entering Australia last year, nearly 12,000 filled skilled regional places, about 6 per cent of the total intake.
Settlement Council of Australia chief executive Nick Tebbey says the Government's idea is a precarious one.
"I think that's a real risk. And if we focus only on the restrictions and the conditions in that regard, I think that has the potential to send the wrong messaging, that migrants maybe are a burden or aren't welcome in the cities."
But a Melbourne planning analyst says population pressures are so significant in Australia that encouraging migrants to live in regional areas would make little impact.
Emeritus professor of environment and planning Michael Buxton, at RMIT University, says the problem is governments have failed to plan and build the infrastructure to cope with rapid population growth.
He says that is particularly true in Sydney and Melbourne.
Alan Tudge concedes Sydney is in what he calls a "catch-up stage" when it comes to infrastructure.
Professor Buxton says the infrastructure failings have occurred because governments have relied too much on the private sector.
"They've deregulated governance and left a lot open to the private sector, so there's this sort of mentality built up in Australian governments that governments really don't need to do too much. And they've handed over responsibility to the private sector for more and more decision-making. And when it comes to an issue such as infrastructure, this mental attitude has really caught them short and led to a crisis."
Professor Buxton says Melbourne is adding a million more residents every eight years, with some forecasts predicting the population will reach 10 million by 2050.
He says even if the federal government relieved that population pressure by convincing a million migrants to settle in regional areas, Melbourne and Sydney would still face challenges.
"The scale of the increase is still going to be concentrated in the capital cities, despite herculean attempts by government to develop regional settlement, along with a massive infrastructure cost that that will involve, such as the opposition in Victoria are now proposing, you know, nearly $20 billion to provide fast rail."
Professor Buxton says some of the most congested cities in the world, like Los Angeles, are now taking infrastructure challenges seriously, with significant investment in public transport.
"Los Angeles, San Francisco, all the West Coast cities have got massive new public-transport infrastructure programs, involving the complete rebuilding, in many cases, of the city's public transport. Over the rest of the world, or much of the world, governments actually play this role, including the big mega Asian cities. So governments really need to adopt the responsibility of planning and anticipating the infrastructure needs and then going about building it, and stop being reactive and, as Mr Tudge said, trying to play catch-up."
