First female (childfree) PM

Haven’t felt like writing due to the usual frustration and despair, so I have accumulated another backlog of articles.

So Australia has a new Prime Minister, and the first woman PM, at least until the actual Federal Election sometime this year. Julia Gillard is unmarried (she has a partner) and childless by choice, which is certainly a first for a national leader

“I wasn’t someone who in my teenage years or even in my 20s was saying the big thing I want to do in life is have kids.”

[…]

Her childless status has been scorned by political opponents, with Liberal senator Bill Heffernan sparking a storm in 2007 by saying she was “deliberately barren” and therefore unqualified to run the country.

And barely a day had passed when a letter was printed bemoaning the fact she wasn’t a mother:

I’ll cheer when a mother is PM

I can well imagine the conversations around the water cooler yesterday; certainly all the women on Facebook are thrilled that a woman has been elected prime minister. Childless women are incredulous that Julia Gillard has been elected despite being unmarried and childless. Those of us with children are perhaps less surprised.

I would consider it more of an achievement if she had children and been made prime minister, because a woman with children, to some extent, can never have the drive and single vision to compete with a man for such a position.

A man who is a “success” will have a supportive partner, who is caring for his children as only another parent can, while he climbs the ladder of success. How rare for a career woman to get that same level of support.

I’m not blaming men. Women such as Gillard are unlikely to choose a partner who is content to stay home with children, or work part time around school drop-off and pick-up. I accept that motherhood is not for everyone, but the day a mother is elected as prime minister is the day I will celebrate true equality.

– Hariklia Heristanidis, Malvern East

The writer evidently didn’t read Julia’s remark about not wanting children. And if a childless man had similarly been elected, would he get such criticism?

Of interest is that the PM said that she was against a “Big Australia”, in an obvious rebuke to Kevin Rudd’s earlier statement. Unfortunately one of the major election issues is that of asylum seekers (“boat people”), who are a relatively small part of Australia’s immigration intake, rather than the huge numbers coming in via legal immigration (e.g. to work here) and the high birthrate. An example is given in the article “Skilling time: migrants wait for lucky break”, mentioning couples from various countries immigrating to Australia (some reluctantly because of separation from family and culture).

Ms Arori, who is expecting a baby next month, said: “In our country [India], there are opportunities but we were not getting them. It was very difficult to survive over there.”

A main reason there is lack of opportunity in India, the UK and other countries mentioned is that all have high populations! Thus there is huge competition for limited jobs. This is an example of the spillover effect – people leaving one country for one with perceived better opportunities, but in turn the population of Australia is growing and people here are now facing the same problem, thus inciting resentment against migrants. If Australia’s population becomes huge, there is nowhere else for its citizens to go (assuming other countries keep growing also).

(I might note that I am not against immigration as such – my Dad is a UK immigrant, for one thing – but am against excessive immigration.)

“The PM’s dilemma: letting the ‘right’ people in”, The Age, 4/7. More details of what Julia will have to deal with if she wishes to slow growth. Whether she is serious about this – or just pandering to voters before an election – is unclear.

But when Gillard says she does not support the idea of a “big Australia”, what exactly does she intend to do about it? In broad terms, she has two options: either convince people to have fewer kids or cut migration by issuing fewer student, permanent or temporary visas.

The government is hardly going to start discouraging the former, given a number of its policies are designed to do exactly the opposite. Anyway, it is migration that has mainly been driving the population increase.

So if our new PM is serious about wanting to avoid a big Australia, the only realistic option is to slash our annual intake. That will in turn mean accepting lower rates of economic growth. It will also mean angering business groups. For years, migration has underpinned the economy by plugging skills shortages while fuelling construction and consumer spending.

We should be cutting the birth rate as well (abolish the baby bonus!) – Australia has one of the highest in the developed world, which is certainly nothing to be proud of, and sets a poor example to developing countries.

Businessman Dick Smith was delighted with the PM’s statements. I seriously want to shake his hand, or something! He doesn’t appear to have a personal website, though.