Burke stands by sustainable population

Federal Population Minister Tony Burke says a union leader's call for a "big
Australia" is simplistic.
Australian Workers Union (AWU) secretary Paul Howes has written a piece for The
Sunday Telegraph newspaper, expressing disappointment with the "narrow and crass
debate" that has confused refugee policy with the nation's immigration program.
"Australia needs migrants," he writes.
"We need population growth to grow our economy, to provide the taxpayer base needed
to fund our ageing population and to sustain the manufacturing and service
industries that our country should have."
But Mr Burke on Sunday told Sky News that debate around population that focused
purely on numbers missed the point.
"The distribution of population through Australia is what makes it work or not
work," he said.
"For people who say there's an economic driver by having more and more people, well,
not if they're in the wrong parts of the nation from where the economy needs them.
"We need to be smarter than saying, `Well, if we get more people that's more
construction, more housing."
Former prime minister Kevin Rudd was a believer in big Australia but one of the
first things Julia Gillard did after seizing leadership was to voice support for
"sustainable population".
Mr Burke stood by the approach, and argued that decentralisation could now be driven
by the market - the mining boom, the movement of retirees and the National Broadband
Network - rather than government intervention.