Media Releases 2006

Monday, 23 October 2006 

The Federal Government's baby bonus is encouraging an increased birth rate, which will put 

more pressure on Australia's and the world's already overstressed environment. 

Recent figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed 265,000 babies were born in 

Australia last year, the highest number since 1971 and an increase of 15,000 from the 

previous year. Such an unhelpful increase in births is made worse through the Howard 

Government's $4,000 baby bonus. 

29 March 2006 

The population of the mid-north coast of NSW will double within 15 years. A public conference at 

Johns River near Port Macquarie will address the environmental, social and economic implications of 

this doubling next month.  

Sustainable Population Australia inc (SPA) is organising the event with the help of an active local 

committee. National President of SPA, Ms Jenny Goldie, says this doubling must be put in context of 

two converging crises. 

24 January 2006. 

The West Papuan asylum seekers who recently arrived by outrigger canoe should be 

given at least temporary refuge in Australia, according to Sustainable Population 

Australia inc. (SPA). 

National President of SPA, Ms Jenny Goldie, says the 43 West Papuans, currently 

housed on Christmas Island, clearly fit the definition of political refugee under the 

1951 Refugee Convention. 

“Once the necessary health checks have been done, they should be brought to 

19 January 2006 

The Productivity Commission has discovered what all competent analysts have 

known for years, namely, that there is little if any correlation between increased 

population growth and growth of per capita GNP, according to Sustainable 

Population Australia inc. (SPA). 

The Productivity Commission’s draft report on the Economic Impacts of Migration 

and Population Growth was released this week.  

National vice-president of SPA, Dr John Coulter, says that politicians of both major 

Both sides of politics, in their debate and grandstanding over South East Queensland’s water, highlight 

they have not grasped the fundamentals to good resource management and they are not leading South 

East Queensland to a better future.   

While one side of government solution is to build more dams and the other is to dither over the 

consequences of proceeding down that environmentally unsound path, both have forgotten that there are 

limits to growth.