Easy Aussie-bashing misses the point
Far more Kiwis live in Australia than vice versa, says outwardbound John Weekes.
Why would any New Zealander want to move to Australia now? Their economy’s spluttering. Their country’s infested with xenophobia and rampageous ‘‘Australia First’’ rhetoric, creepily reminiscent of the insular garbage seeping out of Trump’s America.
Worse still, Australians treats Kiwis like second-class citizens. They’re bigots.
They’re bullies. And our Bill English is standing by, doing nothing while the Ockers strip away the last few rights of Kiwi students and other expats.
So we’re told.
Again, why would any Kiwi move there now? I ask myself, since I’m about to head there – conveniently, when trans-Tasman relations hit the pits, hit lows not seen since the underarm bowling incident, or that time some Aussie insisted Russell Crowe was a Kiwi.
‘‘Bugger off!’’ you might say. But I tell you, Australia’s climate and big skies evoke a sense of possibility and adventure. It’s diverse. It’s vast. It’s interesting. The natural environment is stunning; in many places, pristine.
Of course, some of those things are correctly said of New Zealand. But net migration from New Zealand to Australia averaged 17,000 a year from 1979 to 2016. The years that more people moved east have been blips.
If Kiwis thought Australia was a backward, bigoted hellhole, they wouldn’t move there.
For thousands of New Zealanders waking up to dismal winter days in cold, overpriced homes, Australia (except Tasmania) still appeals.
Moving countries, obviously, involves some tough decisions but it’s often faster and cheaper to get to the Aussie eastern seaboard than travelling from New Zealand’s big cities to our provincial centres.
This weekend, at least three different airlines offered flights from Auckland to Sydney for less than 200 bucks, even for bookings made just two days before flying.
Meanwhile, flights to Invercargill started with a $299 pearler ‘‘partly operated by Mt Cook Airlines trading as Air New Zealand link’’ involving a stop in Christchurch and taking an insane 14 hours all up. Fourteen hours!
Big cities separated by the Tasman are often closer, economically and culturally, than they are to their own outback or provincial centres.
Professional sportspeople, entertainers, businesspeople and others are part of a trans-Tasman world, with a trans-Tasman world view.
For many, national identities are blurred – it’s hard to choose one country over the other, and why should they?
What then for the rights of New Zealanders across the ditch? For those who choose to move, Australia seems like a land of opportunity. That’s not the same as a land of entitlement.
Why should the Australian taxpayer fork out for people who, soon after arriving, get fired, get sick or want a degree? What difference should it make if you’re a Kiwi citizen?
But if you’re still there and gainfully employed in a few years, you’ll probably have a different opinion. An opinion much like that of many Kiwis who contribute to Australia and are now pretty pissed off.
There are teachers, entertainers, parents, friends, activists, entrepreneurs, academics. Some are so appreciated in Australia, that country infamously tried to claim them as its own. Australia would be wise not to Oz-tracise those who add billions to the economy, never mind contribute to the tapestry of Australian society.
But forget lofty or emotional concepts. Bill English, like any prime minister, faces a numbers game when confronting issues about equal treatment for expats.
In absolute and per capita terms, there are more Kiwis there (an estimated 610,000 to 654,000) than Aussies over here (62,700 at the 2013 census, and an estimated 74,700 now). That easily feeds a perception that any burden Australian expats impose here is much smaller than Malcolm Turnbull faces with Kiwis.
As long as this lopsided demographic situation continues, coupled with an Australian Government facing deficits, the Canberra taxman will have his own, unsympathetic view of what equal treatment means, and no appeals to the Anzac spirit seem likely to change that.
Bill English did try to point this out, amid rabid calls for ‘‘retaliation’’ this week and claims a sneaky Aussie ploy about higher education fees for Kiwi citizens was akin to ‘‘bullying’’.
Ramping up anti-Aussie rhetoric won’t achieve anything. Appeals to nationalism are hollow and disingenuous when both countries’ fortunes are interwoven in every meaningful sense – family, friendship, love, entertainment, business.
Instead, we might ask: Why would any Australian want to move to New Zealand now? More Aussies here would even up the argument, and make Turnbull think again before stripping expats’ rights.
Sydneysider Melinda Lim told Stuff last year she liked friendly and easy-going Kiwis, hated Sydney’s rat race, and found Auckland’s restaurants and events as good as those back home.
Others cited a strong Kiwi economy, political stability, attractive countryside, and the cost of living.
But what some Australians hate about Sydney is what many Kiwis love – the hustle, the bustle, never mind the many choices for work and recreation.
Outside of Sydney, the living cost, house price and rat-race issues have not been strong push factors.
Melbourne is consistently rated the world’s most liveable city. Brisbane, home to an estimated 100,000 Kiwis, boasts considerably lower house prices than Auckland.
It will take years of smart growth or a visionary mayor like the innovative Brazilian genius Jaime Lerner before Auckland solves its transport and sprawl problems and gets the liveability and global profile it deserves.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) this year reckons Australia’s GDP per capita to be 35 per cent more than New Zealand’s. Our economy will probably need to be on steroids longer than Marion Jones or Lance Armstrong to pull ahead, even on economic measures which impact quality of life – and, in turn, often influence decisions people make about where to get married, raise children and retire.
The housing quagmire – too few good new homes, too many crappy, overpriced, uninsulated old ones, a public housing provider that used spurious meth decontamination guidelines to evict families, soulless urban sprawl based on discredited post-war models – isn’t making our cities more attractive.
So instead of flirting with nationalism or blasting the PM or Gerry Brownlee for being soft on Australia, let’s recognise the many reasons so many Kiwis still choose to live in Australia. And ask, what would make more Australians move here?
Let Bill English know when you’ve got an answer. He sure as hell could use one.
If Kiwis thought Australia was a backward, bigoted hellhole, they wouldn’t move there.