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Influx of 238,964 migrants arrived in New Zealand in the year to March, with Stats NZ also reporting a record annual net loss of NZ citizens

Economy / news
Influx of 238,964 migrants arrived in New Zealand in the year to March, with Stats NZ also reporting a record annual net loss of NZ citizens
Airport immigration counters

New Zealand's net population gain from migration surged to a new record over the March year, reaching levels more than double what it was pre-Covid.

Statistics NZ estimates migration added a net gain of 111,145 people to NZ's population in the 12 months to March this year, compared to a net gain of 49,684 in the 12 months to March 2019 and 50,932 in the 12 months to March 2018.

The net gain came from an estimated 238,964 long term arrivals, and an estimated 127,818 long term departures from NZ.

The long term arrivals where overwhelmingly non-NZ citizens, with 213,213 arriving in the year to March, while just 25,750 NZ citizens arrived back in the country after an extended stay overseas.

Long term departures from NZ were more mixed, with 78,246 NZ citizens departing long term in the year to March, compared to 49,572 non-NZ citizens.

That meant there was a net loss of 52,496 NZ citizens in the March year, and a net gain of 163,641 citizens of other countries.

"This is the first time the annual net migration loss of New Zealand citizens has exceeded 50,000," Statistics NZ population indicators manager Tahseen Islam said.

The previous record loss of NZ citizens was 44,400 in the year to February 2012.

The main source countries for overseas citizens migrating to NZ were India, the Philippines, China and Fiji.

The table below shows the net monthly and annual migration gains or losses since 2001.

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Net long term migration

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101 Comments

With this going rate,  we need more houses, schools, hospitals, roads and everything.

 

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21

Don't worry. Willis is onto it.

Apparently tax cuts for "low and middle income earners" (yeah, right!) and tax cuts for landlords will see more houses, schools, hospitals, roads and everything built. It'll all become clear May 30th. She's really good with spreadsheets - or so I hear.

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38

Would the last lot be better 

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2

Considering the existing backlog valued by InfraNZ at over a hundred billion dollars, we need to brace for rapidly falling standards in infrastructure and public services.

Erica Stanford admitted last month that more than half of all incoming workers are classed as unskilled or low-skilled. It is safe to then assume these workers will neither help build the infrastructure nor pay their way in tax dollars or via economic activity.

All that before we figure out who is going to operate and maintain those hospitals, schools, etc.

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28

They'll go back to the old limited immigration visas as pre-2020 was, where applications will stack up and up once they hit their approval limit for the year and the rest will sit until rollover. How else will they reverse this when the medium term impacts of so many unskilled and likely soon to be unemployed immigrant workers, are realised.  

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5

These people are needed to drive us to the airport.

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11

Later this year they wont be....8/8

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2

Talking to my Uber driver in the weekend - been here for 4 years - wife is retraining as a nurse... again... and he is struggling to support her and their child driving in the gig economy.. Too many drivers now he reckons. Hard to get fares. Dogs are eating dogs. Poor bugger - tipped him in cash for a few nappies and some infant formula.

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7

Ah, one of those that have no idea of what skills us imigants bring. 

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1

My friend Mohammad arrived from Tehran last year with both a degree and experience in medical imaging. He has a work visa while his wife does a PhD in medical imaging. Are they counted as two skilled immigrants? Or one student and the other a house painter which is the only job he can find?

In this case NZ would be a better place if they both became residents and stayed in NZ. An intelligent but humble couple with a really important skill. It is the other 100,000 we don't need. I'm guessing they will find accommodation just to expensive and wil return home about fourr years from now.

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6

No, NZ has needed this for a while now.

There is a housing crisis ( cost of buying and renting as well as available stock) already.

There is a health crisis ( available doctors, nursing and specialist ) already 

There is a school crisis ( quality of education ) already. 

There is a infrastructure ( roads quality and capacity, public transport ) already.

 

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0

Pretty cool that we can import all these people and they don't need any homes in which to sleep, don't have to drive on the roads, don't compete with Kiwis for a dwindling supply of jobs and never visit the hospital when they are sick or injured.

It's like the infinite money cheat I used to use when playing The Sims ... no downsides at all, right? ;) 

 

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50

but we've built so many cycle lanes... 

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10

We'll need more cycle lanes as few will able to afford cars soon ... And cycle lanes are cheaper than the doctors and nurses needed to treat cyclists injured by car drivers.

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7

Confused..The National Party has put forward a proposal to revert to the previous immigration target of 45,000 to 50,000 people annually?

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16

Apparently - yes. 

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6

Yes, but you need to factor in the delays in a) processing times and b) people proceeding with coming here.  Many of these immigrants were probably granted visas prior to National (happy to be proven wrong).

Next year's numbers will be telling. 

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8

haha yeah - and dont forget 7houseluxon and his band of merry landlords need to factor in keeping the price of their portfolios from crashing...

... and they all have private healthcare and public funded apartments near work.. the migration changes will probably have slipped into the 10000 day plan :)

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8

You shouldn't be confused Baywatch, the figures are for the 12 months to March 24. National made this pledge in February. You see Baywatch, they can't change immigration that happened in the past, under Labours watch.

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10

Oh I see...Labour have been in charge upto March right...so the numbers will now stop or reverse..is that what your saying?

(By the way National campaigned on this pledge)

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3

Net migration for this month was 4,500, so annualised that's 54,000. 

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8

45k is triple the per capita legal immigration in average OECD countries.

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5

Let me guess Tom, Dick and Harry arrived.

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6

Yep, we have hired a few low skilled Dick's lately.

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5

FYI these stats don't include the changes Erica Stanford brought in early April to the AEWV scheme. Next months stats will start to include those changes so I'd expect probably 2 months out you'll see the impact of that policy there. In addition, I expect long term departures to continue to rise with the job market rapidly slowing.  

 

 

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4

Long term departures of NZ born citizens you mean (the young and brightest hopefully)

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7

Wait...you'd prefer the young and brightest to leave long term, rather than stay and try to turn NZ around? Wouldn't you rather the dead weight left instead?

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0

I'm in favour of telling young people to leave. NZ doesn't deserve them. The priority of this government is to look after landlords of which we have too many.

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12

Long term departures of NZ born citizens you mean (the young and brightest hopefully)

There's no distinction between a citizen born here and one who migrated here. It could be a large proportion are using their recently acquired citizenship to get entry to Australia which was the goal all along. 

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4

The two Maori I'm distantly related to by marriage are in Australia. Why is Australia so popular with Maori?

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1

Because Australians aren't as racist towards them.

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1

It's (net) certainly trending down. Perhaps the words getting out that we're fast running out of jobs. In any case, with the spigots being closed to all and sundry arrivals (except skills sought after) - it was destined to head south by Government action anyway. What's worth watching/worrying over is the over-shoot of our highly skilled to OZ, driven by disillusionment.

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11

The great replacement continues.

Native-born NZers disillusioned with the state of the economy and society decamp to greener pastures.

Meanwhile we import grateful hordes from the third world to keep business owners happy.

 

*sigh*

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32

At least we're not as bad as Canada, yet

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0

They take some beating, including the woke, fake ’Progressiveness’ of the leader

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3

Sadly their current downfall is the lack of ability to eject their leader. We were lucky enough to have an election as opportunity. 

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0

Since then more people are leaving...

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1

Might want to pick a better phrase there, chief.

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4

"The main source countries for overseas citizens migrating to NZ were India, the Philippines, China and Fiji."

The prospect for NZ look bleak. No wonder more and more Kiwis are upping sticks. 

I live in Auckland and am shocked and surprised when I run into a Kiwi let alone anyone that speaks English. 

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19

I went to Chemist Warehouse the other day to buy a fragrance for my wife (who says romance is dead?) and was served by a very friendly and enthusiastic Chinese sales assistant ... I know she was Chinese as I learned Mandarin for a few years and recognised some phrases when she was serving another customer, so I'm not pulling a Phil Twyford here. 

She was at great pains to tell me that although she'd only been in Christchurch for a couple of weeks (and it was a bit cold to her liking) she preferred it to Auckland where she had been for the past several years, as there weren't so many immigrants.

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14

This reminds me a lot of both Indians and Poles that I worked with in London. They actively disliked any compatriot that arrived in last ten years. Mind you anyone that moves to Berlin hates all others that arrive after they do. 

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6

Cooks, bottle washers and labourers in. Doctor's, nurse's, IT people and qualified tradesman out.

#winning 

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14

Hopefully that pushes up the wages for good tradesmen 🤞

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0

Such wage inflation resulting from acute shortages rather than increased productivity will do more harm than good to the sector and the broader economy. The last time we saw a large exodus of construction workers, the economy was worse off because new projects didn't get off the ground amid all the staffing shortages.

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4

The increase of almost 240,000 migrants into a small country over a year should not be done without a referendum. This will have a significant change in the cultural and societal fabric of the country. This isn't a comment on whether this will be bad OR good, but it will have a large impact. As such, the citizens should make the decision. 

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36

Let’s not dance around. It is bad.

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24

Referendum? .... "tell him he's dreamin".

There's more chance of finding Lord Lucan riding around on Shergar than there is of an immigration referendum ever happening.

Why? Because both the political left and right are hooked on the weapons-grade crack that is mass, low quality immigration - they are merely puffing on the pipe for different reasons.

The right loves mass immigration because it's the easiest source of cheap, compliannt labour and ever-increasing demand which is required to feed the beast, particularly for housing which means higher rents and more valuable property. Remember how the "business lobby" squealed about the way that potentially restricting migration might negatively impact the economy (i.e. their profit) to the point where Labour caved despite being in a strong position to say 'no'? 

In the NZ context, centrist NZ First only exists because its leader is cunning enough to pick an issue or two that gets an easy combined 5% of the vote. That's why Winston has stopped yapping about immigration and instead has chosen to focus on toilets and Covid.

The more extreme left (e.g. (e.g. Greens) loves mass immigration because it's the easiest way to atone for the perceived past and present evils of formerly heterogenous European/Anglo societies and assuage post-Colonial guilt, in doing so laying the foundations for a 'post-national' state where we can all live in a utopia where 'diversity is our greatest strength'. The only caveat for this portion of the left is the less European and more unemployable and welfare-dependent the immigrants, the better.

The mainstream left loves mass immigration because it provides a steady stream of future lower income voters, and the overpaid public sector management and academic class (which sets the agenda - not the 'working class' who are sufficiently stupidly tribal to keep voting Labour despite the shafting that mass immigration brings, perhaps until something drastic occurs that crystalizes a fomenting resentment towards immigration policy e.g. the collapse of the Red Wall in Britain with Brexit and the last election) is paid well enough to be utterly insulated from the negative effects of mass immigration.

They get the positives - talking a big game about diversity to feel good about yourself and advance your career, access to interesting cuisine options, discounted gig economy services e.g. Uber, and higher property values as they are hypocritical Scrooge McDucks when it comes to their own wallets - with no exposure to the downsides as they can afford the likes of health insurance, private education for the kids, and to live in pleasant areas with good schooling and amenities away from the poor people they claim to cherish. 

The average Kiwi, whether of left or right-leaning persuasion, is just collateral damage. Forced to endure ever-worsening traffic and hospital wait times, crowded classrooms and worsening infrastructure as a gang of morons from across the political spectrum refuses to let up the beatings. 

At this point you'd almost be forgiven for thinking the people who yap on endlessly about Klaus Schwab and the WEF wanting a world where "you'll own nothing" and merely be a unit of human capital actually might have a point, as it all seems so concerted. Slowing immigration to 50k per year is merely  polishing the brass on the Titanic.

The only meaningful move at this point would be a complete border shutdown for such time - for however long it takes, decades if required - until we have allowed infrastructure to catch up and housing costs to normalise, with the exception being for truly skilled immigrants in categories like medical care ... where we cannot so easily train in a short enough timeframe from the current population pool, or coax an existing Kiwi into doing the work through forcing employers to pay higher wages by removing the access to cheap imported labour. 

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23

Solid rant. Ima give it 8/10. Could have used a few swear words but overall a good effort. 

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5

....And they all have a job to settle into? 

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2

Going by all the news article into this topic, many are juggling multiple parttime and gig roles to scrape enough money to afford life here. That may appear nightmarish to the average Kiwi but, to an unskilled migrant from a third-world country, this is paradise compared to what they leave behind.

They have my sympathy although I firmly believe we lack the economic means to be running an economic refuge here and desperately need a major overhaul of the entire system.

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11

I saw on the news on this side of the ditch that Australia got 47000s new kiwi migrants YTD.. No wonder house price is creeping up!

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9

It's much easier for Kiwi's to get Australian citizenship now so it's easier to make a long term commitment there. Less will be coming back too. 

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8

At the moment, but if the Coalition win the next election it will be pulled before any of the recent arrivals qualify. That would be bad news for many Kiwi's.

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2

It would only make sense for them to do that if the people they are getting from here are worse than the people they get from Asia and other places.

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3

The citizenship pathway has meant that the type of person immigrating to Australia has changed. Its no longer just the young single professional going to try their luck in the Lucky Country, its now three generations of entire families. Parents, kids, grandparents. All secure in the knowledge that after 4 years citizenship is guaranteed, so the grandparents can get aged care, the kids can go to University, the parents can get tax and welfare support.

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4

1) Citizenship is not guaranteed, the Coalition will repeal the eligibility ( a guaranteed vote winner)

2) Kiwi's can attend all Australian Uni's with the same admission and fee criteria as locals. THey qualify for HECS after 10 years even without citizenship.

3) Australian Super starts at 67 and is means-tested so most Kiwi's won't qualify even if citizens. Much better off staying in NZ where it is not means tested and starts 2 years earlier.

 

Hope that clears it up for you.

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2

If the LNP take the treasury benches they will likely retain the citizenship pathway for anyone that arrived in Australia during the duration of the 4 year pathway (so the 4 year process still applies to anyone that arrived and started their 4 year countdown) but will remove it for anyone that arrived if the LNP change the criteria.

LNPs main issue is, and always has been, the ease of which PRs in New Zealand get citizenship and then bugger off literally the day after getting NZ citizenship - despite such new citizens making a declaration they intend to reside in NZ.

If the DIA actually followed up to see if those declarations of intent were honoured, and strip citizenship from those who have exhibited no intent to remain in Nz, eg left NZ within a month of citizenship conferral, with no date of return, then the LNP would likely not have such an anti-kiwi stance. 

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1

Desperados of often dubious quality from the third world incoming, and many great homegrown kiwis driven out by cost of living

slow hand claps for successive governments 

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16

That's many 'Young' kiwis. This is pretty irrelevant to the large older voting block - they get higher house prices and cheaper nurses for when they need it. 

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4

Yep, young kiwis are getting well and truly f#%ed on multiple fronts

shameful

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11

I saw my wonderful, young-ish GP last week, yet another heading to Aus. Very sad to lose him, but good on him for finding a better life over there

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5

HM. A year 4 medical student relative working in a teaching hospital, recently looked at me a little pityingly for my naiveté when I asked where in NZ they would like to settle and practise. They will work permanently overseas. As will every one of their current trainee doctor flatmates.   

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8

All those who were selected for special entry into medical school on the basis of their race should be banned from leaving the country. That negates the sole reason why they got given a place at medical school instead of someone more worthy. Now we have the best and brightest enrolling at medical schools in Australia because they cant get placed in NZ, and the lower quality cohort of students accepted are leaving for Australia as well. Doubly stuffed.

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7

Let me guess after you ban them from leaving the country are you going to insist they work? .Do you happen to have a General Lee sticker on your car?

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4

Never mind how they got admitted into medical school. Considering the taxpayer subsidises the majority of the cost of an expensive medical degree I'd be bonding them to work a certain number of years in NZ or else they can pay full price.

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6

Should it work both ways? The ones that work in NZ all their lives get a tax rebate for their significant contribution to society?

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1

KW. Those accepted for med school through the MAPAS program are subject to exactly the same academic process, examination rigour and pass rate threshold standards as all medical students.      

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2

Stop it with your facts and evidence. Will someone not just think of the poor rich white man for once???

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4

Yep, heavily discriminated against. Maori now a massive 5% of doctors, the buggers are taking over.        

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3

The joke is that without diversity quotas the majority of those who qualify for courses on the basis of exam results are white girls from middle-class or wealthy households and those of Asian ethnicity (at least in the US). White males need a helping hand too.

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1

It's madness, just crazy. The vehemence with which young professional people tell me they are off overseas permanently after they graduate is worrying. I push them on this, pointing out the Kiwi OE is a longstanding rite of passage and surely they'll follow we boomers footsteps and be back at some stage. But the passion with which they adamantly insist they'll not be coming back is noticeably different to the way we thought when their age. They are very firmly slamming the door on this country on the way out.      

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7

Yep. The ones that recently left our firm have expressed absolutely no intention of coming back.

They are completely disillusioned with previous generations decision to pull up the ladder after them, load up future generations with debt and infrastructure deficits their flat out resistance to even the most tiny lifestyle choice changes  to preserve a human habitable biosphere.

It's a pretty damning indictment on a whole generations values that they would rather leave their family and this beautiful country than spend any more time sharing oxygen with the spiteful talkback radio ranters. 

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10

Do we know how many of 52,000 NZ citizens leaving are of Maori descent?

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3

Oh here we go.................

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11

This is the dude who thought the Moriori were here before the Maori, hence Maori are not the indigenous people of this country

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2

Are you hoping for a great natural replacement process?

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2

Well, a lot of data has a special category for Maori people, like the cost of living index for example, so I was wondering if that data was available for migration as well ?

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4

My guess is they’ll be over represented in that stat vs their proportion of population… why, because a lot go when there is nothing on offer here in nz vs what they perceive they can achieve in Oz… lots have whanau already there too.

Some of course go off the rails and end up 501’s for us - yay!

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Deleted due to poor reading comprehension 

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0

Digging a little deeper into the numbers on MBIE data explorer, in the last 6 months there have been only 11,600 net arrivals. There have been 80,000 net departures in the last two months. 52,000 net departures in April alone. Up from 19,000 last April.

The trend of arrivals is slowing and the trend of departures is ramping up.

16% decrease in arrivals on work visa compared to April last year. And actually the only real increase in arrivals when comparing to April last year is on visitor visa, and 1,000 more students, all else is trending down.

Departures trending up in every way.

The big immigration story is over and we are yet to "cover" off the losses of covid.

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Good work. That confirms the anecdotal trend I was seeing in Auckland.

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Correct.

For the reality, look at Stats migration data:

https://www.stats.govt.nz/assets/Uploads/International-migration/Intern…

Start at cell QA167 (annual numbers) on the Net Migration tab and scroll your way up for a few years.

Do the same for QA86 (monthly numbers).

Then consider that the numbers for April (going by arrivals and departures) may reveal a trend of rapidly declining net migration.

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1

Hope they brought their own solar panels, or gensets with them?

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3

ABSURD

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1

CRAZY

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0

Hmm, we were told people would start leaving when Labour were elected, when in fact they are leaving with National. I wonder if it is young people knowing they have no chance whatsoever now. 

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2

Yes you see that sort of rhetoric often especially if you look at the comments in the Herald, but actually makes more sense for young people to leave under National who mostly want to look after those who already have the assets/wealth. 

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3

Except these are mostly last years numbers, under Labour policy

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Nope, the trend of more leaving reversed after National got in

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0

Good, we need more people, our population is way too small for anything to happen.

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0

So we need to turn NZ into an overcrowded s hole because Kev is bored? 

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12

Beyond bored. Unfortunately due to our small population, we struggle to initiate any significant infrastructure projects because there aren’t enough users to justify their construction. Sounds insane but it is the sad fact. Things happen so slow and cost so much in this country it is laughable.

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With a smaller population we wouldn't need "significant infrastructure projects" and we wouldn't need to concrete over what remains of the NZ natural environment. Enough is enough!

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1

Sounds great until you need the hospital for a medical event and have to wait 15hours to be seen. They;'1l struggle to keep any form of service levels with the level of incoming demand, coupled with the ageing baby boomers increased medical needs. While I see your point of view when comparing to economies of scale overseas, we're growing the population too fast, and with the wrong spread of calibre of immigrants. No race or anything included in that statement, just plain simple skill level.

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7

A surgeon mate tells me the immigrant community is a 'heavy user of the health system' and that 'serious health problems are common among them'. He's a bit of a leftie wokester so has no political axe to grind on this issue. 

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6

Found the guy who runs a vape store (or at least sells to them ... there's one on every street corner now)

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1

Granddad's old axe.

All the changes and replacements going on (migration/ fleeing overseas and old people passing on) but still the same culture and values of course.

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And people giving up on having families. 

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2

"Statistics NZ population indicators manager Tahseen ISLAM"

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1

Good migration policy is not an issue, there are many families who are able to maintain their living and get good wages for highly skilled work. They bring with them a diverse culture and more variety.

I have a problem with labour hire companies scamming migrants tens of thousands of dollars, bringing in hundreds with no adequate housing available for their family, who need social services support and housing support as the low-no skilled jobs did not magically appear. It is those who are scamming them and the immigration department having such lax and absolutely worthless review teams I blame completely.

I know there are many migrants who are also in NZ to study useless degrees e.g. fine arts, business, ESOL etc that do not result in skilled work but during the period of Labour handing out residency like candy they now use and take kiwis families places in social housing & are on full benefits.

We have a severe housing crisis where we cannot even house most families and have been forcing thousands into cars, unsafe campgrounds and motels which have no cooking or laundry facilities so they cannot live safely or have healthy lifestyles (where if you cannot cook food in a motel room it is a big financial cost and impediment to healthy living).  We have had the largest health event in this generation and still do not have funding to support for most of those who are destitute and unable to work. But we also turn down most kiwis for skilled and more accessible roles. You will not see an improvement until we have a net negative migration figures repeatedly which is impossible and the likelihood of massive infrastructure & social housing investment to the levels needed is not going to happen so it is just inevitable that NZ will get much worse. I know of several families with multiple kids, parents skilled in tech who are homeless in Auckland and have been for months, looking for housing even with decent wages. It is not unusual this it is just a factor in the choice for housing to rent or kids some people had both and then lost one and found they cannot find another to rent.

Most kiwis see the hospitals not adequate for the population numbers leaving far too many people dying of preventable easily treatable conditions, the schools failing children and crippling their education, the jobs becoming more tenuous & more gig contract work, and housing security becoming more unstable and move with their feet... to a country that has just enshrined their mining & extraction sectors for another 30 years. I guess they really did not care so long as the living conditions were better for a family. Incidentally a country with more economic growth and productive work is also better placed to provide social services and Australia is leading NZ in social & human rights protections by 3 decades... they are 3 decades ahead of us in provisions for human rights, in provisions for medical support and they don't even have ACC... geez NZ is really good at increasing the gap as we head further towards calamity with tens of billions of capital lost in the past 3 years for no practical outcome. 

The best thing you can do for family in NZ is help them in their transition to Australia and looking at our elder care sector that is especially true for elderly family who very much will need functioning hospitals and accessible living environments to survive 20-30 years more.

 

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CRAZY

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