8.
:
Building our population through immigration is not a
strahtforward task. We receive enquiries from over a million
persons each year who wish to migrate to Australia.. That round
figure does not include many tens and even hundreds of thousands
of refugees and displaced persons who would welcome the opportunity
of resettlement anywhere, including Australia. There is thus no
shortage of people coming forward voluntarily and in many instances
enthusiastically to help build the Australian population.
I leave it to your imagination to work out the effects of
a completely unrestricted immigration policy on the Australian
community.
Leaving aside all other considerations I have no doubt
that no Government would survive three years of unrestricted entry
of three million or more self-chosen new settlers.
With a non-discriminatory policy there is a real prospect
of a significant change in the regional sources of our migrants.
In the modern world of immediate communication and rapid transport,
even the less developed countries receive information about
Australia instantaneously.
People can travel to Australia by air
within a day and a half from the most distant point of the globe.
Australia has direct air links with many of the countries of our
immediate region and events in Australia are reported in the local
press and by radio and television networks.
from the rest of the world can no longer be seen as tyrannical.
Australia's distance
I mention this because at present one of the great
challenges and problems we have to face in Australia is that of
refugees from countries not far distant making their way south
without authority to enter Australia.
./9
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