Even decades ago, Bob Hawke admitted that immigration was an issue on which both sides of the two-party system conspired to ignore the obvious will of voters. Despite the fact that poll after poll shows that Australians want immigration reduced, both Labor and Liberal are determined to steamroller ahead and import millions of foreigners.
As the Liberal party wets itself into oblivion, there are any number of issues on which it could rebuild its standing with disaffected voters. Immigration is one of the biggest, as yet another poll shows that anti-mass immigration sentiment is building.
Almost two-thirds of Australians want fewer immigrants coming to the country, including 39 per cent who want “a lot fewer”, according to a Newspoll that reveals immigration anxiety across all demographics amid surging support for One Nation.
This is a significant escalation. Previous polls indicated that, while a majority supported cutting immigration, that sentiment was ‘soft’. The new poll shows a significant ‘hardening’ of attitudes.
Of the 64 per cent of voters who want fewer immigrants than now, 39 per cent want “a lot fewer”. In contrast, three per cent want a lot more immigrants, seven per cent want more immigrants than now and 26 per cent support current levels.
Conservative voters were more likely to want fewer immigrants, with 78 per cent of coalition supporters backing immigration cuts compared with eight per cent who want more migration. Only three per cent of One Nation supporters want more immigrants, compared with 94 per cent who want less.
Almost 50 per cent of Labor voters want fewer immigrants compared with 10 per cent who want more.
Among Greens voters, 32 per cent want fewer immigrants and 27 per cent want more.
The poll shows that there is a huge groundswell of support for whichever party has the guts to take a stand against the mass immigration Ponzi scheme. At the moment, the only serious party to do so is One Nation. The demographics also show that this is a huge opportunity for One Nation to shed its ‘old fogey’ image.
While Australians aged over 50 overwhelmingly support fewer immigrants, a majority of younger voters endorse reduced immigration levels.
One in two voters aged between 18 and 34 support less immigration, and 61 per cent of Australians aged between 35 and 49 want fewer immigrants.
For all its image as an ‘old, white party’, not only has One Nation fielded Asian and even Muslim candidates, it’s taken to social media in a way the major parties could only envy. Forget Anthony Albanese’s cringey T-shirts or the Greens’ even more cringey efforts to meme (proving only that the left truly can’t meme): Pauline Hanson’s Please Explain cartoons are genuinely funny and engaging. The release of a feature-length film of the series may well be a lightning rod next Australia Day.
No wonder One Nation is increasingly attracting Gen Z voters. Like this:
[19-year-old Liam McPherson] said the soaring cost of living was a key factor in deciding where his vote went, and the major parties were not doing enough on affordability.
“Why would I vote for people who keep putting the prices of things up?” he said.
“Groceries used to cost a family of five $200, $300 for a week. Now you’re struggling to provide for a single bloke [with that amount of money].”
He said the focus on renewable green technology and energy was detrimental to people who work in agriculture, like him and his family.
And he was worried that housing and infrastructure could not keep up with the pace of immigration.
“I reckon we need a cut back on it. I reckon there’s too many people coming in.”
Even Labor’s own strategists are watching the drift to One Nation and doubling their poll numbers in just a few months.
“The group that is triggering the growth in our polling numbers of One Nation are largely Gen Xers without a university qualification, who are renting or who have a mortgage and are feeling financial pain,” [Kos Samaras] said.
In other words, ordinary Australians: not the inner-city elites.
Newspoll showed university educated voters were considerably more likely to see immigration as beneficial (32 per cent) compared with Australians with TAFE qualifications (19 per cent) or no tertiary education (13 per cent).
Because university-educated voters don’t live in the mortgage-belt suburbs, let alone the fringe suburbs that are the dumping-grounds for the millions of foreigners. When you’re driving over an hour to work, can’t get a doctor’s appointment for weeks and machete-wielding foreign gangs terrorise your local shopping centre, those chi-chi ethnic cafes that so set the inner-city university-graduates’ hearts a-flutter don’t matter a tinker’s cuss.
But the elites don’t experience any of the downsides. So, they’re stomping the foot on the immigration acceleration pedal.
