Labour ramps up the rhetoric on migrants

Yesterday the UKIP wins the UK European elections, and maybe it is no coincidence that David Cunliffe is on TV that night saying that migrants are responsible for our increasing .

3 News reports:

Labour David Cunliffe has taken his hardest line yet against immigrants, blaming them for rising house prices.

It follows a 3 News-Reid Research poll which shows almost two-thirds of voters say immigration should be restricted.

“It would take 80 percent of our supply just to accommodate this year's migrants – and is doing nothing,” says Mr Cunliffe.

This is the politics of blame and xenophobia. The facts do not back up what Cunliffe is trying to get people to accept.

I blogged the data for the last 10 years here. I repeat the key point:

So net migration is 24,000 higher than five years ago. But look at what makes up that 24,000. 15,300 are fewer people leaving. 5,700 are Kiwis returning or Aussies migrating. Only 3,400 are other migrants.

Migration does have an impact on house prices. But the level of migrants coming here has not changed greatly in recent years. In fact residency visas are down on 2008.

Will Labour just dog whistle on this one, or will they come out with a specific policy they propose? Do they propose to scrap work visas for that has been the area of most growth. For if they do, well then it means houses in Christchurch will not get built as quickly – because hey it is those damn migrant workers helping build them.

And now mistruths in this Radio NZ report:

Mr Cunliffe told Morning Report the party has always backed the skills and diversity migrants bring with them, but it must be sustainable.

He said a gross inward flow of about 70,000 migrants is forecast over the coming year, while a figure of about 15,000 has been a rule of thumb in the past.

That's totally wrong. The current figure (PLT arrivals of non NZ citizens) for the year to April 2014 is 71,070. Here's what it was when Labour was in.

  • 2008 – 64,320
  • 2007 – 59,670
  • 2006 – 58,640
  • 2005 – 54,710
  • 2004 – 54,670
  • 2003 – 64,310
  • 2002 – 71,040
  • 2001 – 58,170

15,000 has never been close to the rule of thumb. David Cunliffe was Immigration Minister for two of those years.

UPDATE: Radio NZ has altered their story so it now reads:

Mr Cunliffe cites predictions of net immigration of 40,000 people over the coming year, whereas he says a figure of 15,000 has been the rough rule of thumb in the past.

Why has the story changed. Did David Cunliffe say what the original story quotes him as saying, or did Radio NZ get it wrong. If the latter, then once again we have altering stories with no transparency. If the former, then why did the web story change?

UPDATE2: Have now listened to Morning Report and the error is Radio NZ, but also Cunliffe tried to fudge figures.

Cunliffe did say gross migration was around 72,000. He said it should be lower and Espiner challenged him to name a figure he thought was acceptable. Cunliffe in response said that 15,000 is the normal level of net migration. So Cunliffe did not say gross migration is normally 15,000.  But he was being tricky by talking about gross migration in slating the Government, and then talking net migration for the level under Labour.

I can understand how a Radio NZ reporter got confused and conflated them. Doesn't change the fact though that their original story was wrong and they should note at the bottom of a story when they have changed it from a previous story.

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