In a recent speech to the Sydney Institute, Assistant Minister for Immigration Matt Thistlethwaite said that immigration, for many decades, has had little economic benefit, with many costs:
"For many decades Australia has not had a migration strategy.
As a result, Australia's migration policies have lacked direction and purpose.
Migration has been unresponsive to Australia's needs; it has provided marginal economic benefit and has not enhanced labour productivity.
It has been concentrated on capital cities, creating some social tension and skills shortages have persisted despite steady flows of new arrivals within needed skills and competencies.
The reliance on labour migration to solve our skills gaps led to under investment in vocational education with commensurate falls in apprentices and trainees in key sectors, particularly services, which are vital to our standard of living with an ageing population.
For the last decade it appears that immigration was not benefitting Australians as it had in the past.
To investigate why this had occurred, the Albanese Government asked Dr Matin Parkinson to conduct a wholesale review of Australia's migration system.
The Parkinson Review found that our previous migration system was "broken".
Regarding migration, Dr Parkinson said:
The objectives of the program are unclear, and successive governments and policymakers have responded to challenges through piecemeal reforms which have not addressed fundamental underlying issues.
Of course there is no suggestion here of ending the migration madness, but at least the problem is stated. It is a start.