“Skilled migrants cutback”, The Age; “Skilled migrant intake to be cut by 14 per cent”, Herald-Sun, 16/3: In a rare display of common sense, the Federal Government is making some cuts to the absurdly high migrant intake – admittedly only small cuts to skilled migrants (18 500 over the next three months – 14% of the annual intake – from 133 500 to 115 000 for the 2008-09 financial year).
“My large family: Love multiplies”, Sydney Morning Herald, 5/3. I believe people who choose to have large families should be penalized, perhaps through added child taxes (from the third child onwards), or no access to child-support services. There should be a campaign so that having large families becomes a social stigma. Such a choice is environmentally irresponsible, and puts extra strain on resources. There is also the simple logistics problem of coping with such a large number of children. The mother makes some of the usual mawkish statements about “love” to justify her choice:
I believe we are capable of so much more than we allow ourselves to give. There is always plenty of love to go round in our home and that’s for everyone who ventures through our door, not just our own family.
*Gags* Irrational and irresponsible are more accurate words to describe them.
“Double is trouble when caring for premature babies”, SMH 10/3. Babies tend to be the focus of excessive sentimental mawkishness. This article describes the social and medical costs involved in ensuring very premature babies survive (who might otherwise die), many of whom are multiples due to the use of IVF. I would legislate for a cut-off point (I am not sure what the viable age is – 37 weeks is the normal gestation), before which no medical care would be given (they would die or survive as nature intended). Something which would undoubtedly cause much outrage, but one has to be pragmatic – the health system is under much strain already. Prematures often have medical problems later on in life: “Many premature pupils ‘struggle’ ”, BBC News, 12/3. I’ll requote the comment back in my 28/1/2009 entry:
I’m sick of the baby fetish, and I’m sick of pretending. Natalism has become our nation’s most disturbing fetish.
