Australia will be an ‘Asian country’ with a population of 100 million by next century and there’s ‘not a chance in hell’ we can stop it.
That is the dramatic prediction of Harvey Norman executive chairman Gerald Harvey, saying population growth driven by record immigration was impossible to control.
The 77-year-old said efforts by people like businessman Dick Smith, who launched a gloomy $1 million ad calling to limit immigration, to halt this were doomed to fail.
Harvey Norman executive chairman Gerald Harvey (pictured) says population growth driven by record immigration is impossible to control
Many have blamed immigrants for Australia’s problems, with Chinese investors (pictured at housing sale) blamed for rising house prices
‘Australia is going to become an Asian country, 100 per cent for sure. It’s just a matter of when. You might have close to four billion Asians in the world, where do you think they’re going to live?’ he told News Corp.
‘It’s a utopian idea that some people have, in a lot of ways I can see the worth of it, but will you ever be able to hold it to some number under 25 to 30 million? Not a chance in hell.’
Mr Harvey said Australia was a ‘great big place and no one lives here’ while other continents held much bigger populations.
He predicted Australia would come under ‘immense pressure’ from ‘boat people coming in huge numbers’ or many other sources, and the rest of the world would force it to accept them.
‘Australia is going to become an Asian country, 100 per cent for sure. It’s just a matter of when. You might have close to four billion Asians in the world, where do you think they’re going to live?’ said Harvey (pictured)
As a result, by 100 years from now Australia would have a population of 50 to 100million people, and implied many of them would have arrived from Asia (pictured are Chinese buyers at a housing sale)
As a result, by 100 years from now Australia would have a population of 50 to 100million people he said, and implied many of them would have arrived from Asia.
‘That’s going to happen regardless of what Dick Smith thinks, I think or you think, it’s just inevitable… Sometimes when you smell the inevitable you’ve got to go along with it,’ he said.
A growing number of commentators, and the public, blame immigration increasing from its historical average of 70,000 a year to 210,000 for Australia’s problems.
Chinese investors and immigrants were blamed for rising house prices in Sydney and elsewhere, along with declining living standards.
Mr Harvey’s comments come a fortnight after Dick Smith’s (pictured) ominous advertisement warning of poverty, conflict and overcrowding if immigration is not halted
Mr Harvey’s comments come a fortnight after Dick Smith’s ominous advertisement warning of poverty, conflict and overcrowding if immigration is not halted.
The controversial ad is based on the 1980s Grim Reaper AIDS campaign and features original actor John Stanton.
‘It [population growth] is a path to either more and more inequality, or famine, disaster, war and collapse. Are we that stupid?’ the ad asks.
One Nation Senator Pauline Hanson praised the campaign, saying a population policy is needed.
Mr Smith (pictured) has said Australia will suffer from an increase in terrorist attacks if it continues taking in 200,000 migrants a year
Ms Hanson said the ideal number of immigrants Australia should allow into the country to ensure stability was ‘about 70,000’, a number supported by Mr Smith.
Mr Smith has said Australia will suffer from an increase in terrorist attacks if it continues taking in 200,000 migrants a year.
He told Mark Latham automation and high population growth could leave 40 per cent of the population – 40million people by his estimate – impoverished by 2100.