'You should go home': Jane Hume on the Coalition's migration plan

SPEAKER_1 (0:02)

A listener production.

Chris Spyrou (0:04)

Hey, Chris Spyrou with you and welcome to This Deep Dive, which is my chat with Deputy Liberal Leader Senator Jane Hume. Before we do get into This Deep Dive, a reminder, the headlines are out in the world. You can click on them, they will be in your feed. This is a Deep Dive only episode. Alrighty, let's get into it.

SPEAKER_1 (0:25)

And what we are proposing today is the biggest cut to immigration in the history of this country.

Chris Spyrou (0:32)

So that was Leader of the Opposition Angus Taylor earlier this week, revealing the Coalition's long-awaited migration plan. The Liberals and Nationals want to cut net overseas migration to 100,000 a year, and that's about a third of today's number. It's also less than half of Labor's own target. And they'd slash the number of temporary visa holders by around 650,000 over four years.

So, who gets in, who gets cut, and what does it say about the kind of country the Coalition wants? I sat down with Deputy Liberal Leader Senator Jane Hume yesterday to unpack it all. I also ask whether she's prepared to own the Coalition's part in building the very system it now wants to tear down, and whether it's fair to solely blame migration for Australia's fraying social cohesion. Here's my chat with Senator Jane Hume.

Senator Jane Hume, wow, good start, Chris. Jane Hume, Senator Jane Hume, welcome to The Briefing. How's your morning been?

Jane Hume (1:30)

Very busy, thanks, Chris, but in a good way. We love it like this.

Chris Spyrou (1:33)

I know. You were describing this migration policy and the numbers as like the Apollo 13 landing and moving parts and moving numbers and intricacies and all that. Talk me through the journey. How long has it been getting this policy going?

Jane Hume (1:46)

Well, since Angus Taylor was first elected leader, one of the first things he said in his first press conference was that Australia is a great migrant nation, and we're really proud of that. But recently the numbers have been too high and the standards have been too low and both have to change. And yesterday we announced our policy to do exactly that, bring the numbers down, but more importantly, bring the standards up so that we have the skills that we need to deliver the economic growth and the prosperity that Australians deserve. But the numbers is really important too. We've actually had 1.5 million people come to the country just in the last four and a half years alone. That's an awful lot. That's about the size of Adelaide to put it into perspective. And the number of temporary migrants has blown out too. So now about one in 10 people that are living in Australia, are temporary migrants. And the whole point of a temporary migrant system is that it's supposed to be temporary. You go home and that simply hasn't happened.

Chris Spyrou (2:42)

We'll dig into the numbers and some of the key talking points in a moment. I just want to take a step back and take an overview because when we talk about migration, it's confusing for most people. It's confusing for me as a journalist, and I have to report on this all the time. Let's just talk about the coalitions' view in a general sense without any criticisms of labour, in a general sense when it comes to migration and the place of migration in this country.

How does the coalition view the role of migrants in Australia?

Jane Hume (3:07)

Fundamentally important. I mean, our prosperity and progress has been based on being a great migrant nation for decades. It's actually served Australia really, really well. And there's hardly a family out there that doesn't have a migrant story in it, something that everybody's really proud of, certainly mine has.

But at the same time, we've got to make sure that we get our migration program working in our national interest, not in a sexual interest, not for a particular industry or a particular business, but it has to work for Australians. And that's what it's about. We want to see migrants come to our country, we want to see international students, we want to see permanent migrants come and bring the skills that we need, and we want to see people contribute to the development of the country in the future too. That's kind of what it's all about. But we can't simply rely on it for economic growth. What's happened in the last few years is that the only thing that's kept economic growth up positive has been increases in the size of the population. And 80% of that has been through migration, not through organic population growth.