Jamming us in
As the population quickly increases, roads will be even more congested
Driving to work, going to the beach, going to the shops, taking the train – do you have the feeling you’re getting crowded out? Well, things will only get worse if Premier Anna Bligh has her way. So, welcome to Squeezeland, land of lost dreams!
But there may be some light because, at last, the planet’s most pressing problem – population growth – is being given an airing, even in mainstream media and on the floors of parliaments around the world.
And now the debate and discussion has come with passion to civic centres in southeast Queensland. In fact, there is a rash of forums dealing with this issue.
Some have already taken place while several others are planned for this month (March).
Both Queensland Conservation and the Sunshine Coast Environment Council, with help from other environmental groups, are holding separate public forums on the weekend of March 13-14 in Brisbane and on the Sunshine Coast respectively.
The need for these forums has been triggered to some extent by the State Government’s South East Queensland Regional Plan, which projects an increase in population of 1.6 million to 4.4 million by 2031, and by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd’s call for a ‘Big Australia’ which would boost the nation’s population to 35 million by 2050.
It’s a wake-up call for concerned Australians, especially Queenslanders.
Many environmentalists, scientists, local civic leaders, social commentators, community leaders, business people and, indeed, many of the public have already voiced extreme worries about ‘unsustainable population growth’, and fear that plans to build 750,000 new dwellings in southeast Queensland will destroy extensive areas of farmland, open space and bushland as well as devastate hundreds of wildlife habitats.
There are also rational fears that our lifestyles will suffer with roads even more congested than they are now, mega motorway systems that concrete over yet more green space, beaches crowded out, and infill housing out of character with the present streetscapes and putting pressure on our communities.
Also, a degraded environment will be the norm and our health and education systems, which are already stretched, will continue to deteriorate.
Water and energy supply will become scarcer and more costly. But these two major forums are far more than talkfests.
Expert presenters from many fields, as well as exposing some population myths and vested interests, will show how community action can influence all levels of government to cooperate to address the problems of unsustainable population growth.
At the end of the month (March 30-31) the State Government hosts its own Brisbane forum ominously called ‘Growth Management Summit’ which seems to indicate the Regional Plan’s projected population figures are not really up for debate. The talk will simply be about how to fit in all those extra taxpayers and business customers.
If the science continues to be spurned, Anna Bligh’s forum will be no more than an orchestrated farce; yet another exercise in political spin and big business talk, determined to ignore the real and urgent call for common sense to protect our communities, lifestyle and environment.
It is increasingly apparent that the understanding of the carrying capacity of any system is being ignored and that we, as voters in a democratic process, need to exercise our power to influence the necessary and right outcomes.
If the State Government needs another reminder of the increasing community discontent, the recent Courier-Mail polls show almost 80 per cent of people are concerned at the way southeast Queensland is being destroyed by development.
Simon Baltais, from Sustainable Population Australia, believes decision-making on population needs to be based on science.
“The State Government is ignoring the findings of their own scientific reports, which reveal population is having a significant impact upon southeast Queensland residents and the environment,” he said.
“To say southeast Queensland and coastal Queensland has capacity to absorb more growth ignores the science.”
The State Government slogan of how it is ‘managing growth’ is just hollow and careless rhetoric according to Narelle McCarthy, manager of the Sunshine Coast Environment Council.
“Growth is not being managed and it is increasingly clear it is out of control,” she said. Simon Baltais has a similar viewpoint.
"The government has been talking about managing growth for years to the extent that we have now exceeded critical mass and achieved a critical mess,” he said.
The latest South East Queensland Regional Plan attempts to lock in population figures for the next 20 years, aiming to have 4.4 million crammed into this corner of the state.
So, it is easy to understand why people are becoming more cynical of politicians. The South East Queensland Regional Plan was brought forward and rushed through with limited consultation. Now that it has become law Anna Bligh says we can now have a discussion on population.
Narelle McCarthy claims bad polling and not a genuine desire to address the problem is the motivator for the State Government’s ‘Growth Management Summit’.
“It is shaping up to be nothing more than a talk fest,” she said.
So what can the government do to show it is listening and wanting to act on these concerns?
The population and dwelling figures allocated to each council under the South East Queensland Regional Plan need to be viewed for what they are, population growth projections only.
They should not be mandatory and councils and their communities should have the right to determine the numbers for their own areas. This would involve not only ensuring the biophysical constraints were taken into account but also the character and amenity of an area.
The Sustainable Planning Act, which came into force late last year, supposedly governs the content and direction of planning in this state.
The stated objective of the legislation is to achieve ‘ecologically sustainable development’ something which it has clearly failed to do with the regional plan.
Supporting and parallel action must be taken by the Federal Government to urgently develop a rational or national (or both) population policy that recognises there are limits to growth. With 48 per cent of southeast Queensland population growth being fuelled by overseas migration, this needs to be a priority.
Related articles:
- The Caloundra South Development
- South East Queensland Regional Plan: a ‘scary blueprint’
- Paul Summers: population distribution, size and sustainability
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