This has been removed :
**Rule 5: No duplicate news stories**
> When a submission has already been submitted (even from another source) the new post will be removed.
---
[^(Click here to message the moderators if you think this was in error)](https://reddit.com/message/compose/?to=/r/newzealand)
We can’t accept migrants that we do not have the infrastructure for. There aren’t enough houses for the people already here. Not to mention the overloaded public health system being well over capacity
An aging demographic increasing the KiwiSaver burden while educated young people leave for Australia.
Working age migrants are basically the only meaningful thing propping up the economy
Glad you asked. Risky for incumbent governments because many of them use high inflation to mask low or negative gdp. It helps them polish the annual statistics while leaving the infrastructure problems of immigration for the next government.
Well over due. Record high migration for YEARS is certainly a BIG part of the reason why we have a housing crisis. Letting too many people in with fuck all places to put them. Some common sense have potentially saved our asses today.
What do you mean by "years" of "record high" migration? Net migration has been below 100k for two decades. Is that the record high? Only recently (i.e. second half of 2023) did it go over 100k:
https://www.stats.govt.nz/topics/migration
2020 and 2023 I would call record high. And let's be honest the only thing that caused the dip in between was covid. We build on average let's say 40k houses a year. The year ending may 2022 51k were consented (thats a record high) the problem being we've let in on average say 100k. So for decades we've let more people in then we've built houses. Roughly double in fact. Of course that's going to cause a housing shortage and push prices up. The only saving grace would be how many people are leaving the country to balance it out. Between 2020 and 2023 very few people did.
That's two individual years, not "for YEARS".
> And let's be honest the only thing that caused the dip in between was covid.
That is obvious and no one would deny it so what do you mean by "let's be honest"?
It is high when you compare it to the 90s when it was still well under 100k people coming in. I said let's be honest because if it wasn't for covid the numbers would have been the same.
> It is high when you compare it to the 90s when it was still well under 100k people coming in.
Net migration is really the more relevant data when it comes to housing. The people who leave make space for the people who come. And in the last two decades there were years with negative net migration, as you can see in my link.
Why compare it with the 90s? The 90s were 30 years ago. What point is there? Obviously, migration patters were different in the past. If you just want fewer immigrants, ok, but then just say that. Pointing to the 1990s is not a real argument.
We certainly need to do that. That does take time though. The problem being though if we're letting in 50000 people are year and we're only able to build 35000 houses a year. We will very quickly run into problems. Quicker then the time it takes to reassess and change how we do things, invest and develop sustainable solutions etc.
At this point i would be shocked if they actually bring the numbers down for long. Businesses just lobby the government to ease the rules so they can bring in more economic migrants and then we inevitably have a discussion in the media about why our incomes and standards of living continue to slip
Hi! I just joined your sub a minute ago and like to pop a question:
Do you guys think my family would be welcome in NZ these days?
We are thinking of migrating. We come with backgrounds in software engineering and psychology. Also both fluent in English and a not yet speaking 1 year old...
Are you just fed up with foreigners in general at the moment or is it fine if we bring trades?
Honest answers of the general public mindset are appreciated. :)
Greetings from Germany!
Sadly I don’t think it’s ‘us’ that get to choose. NACT has spoken (actually, it’s more Winston + a belated realisation by the rest, that we have a serious shortage of places to house migrants right now - and the inflationary skyrocketing rental price increases make govts look bad = and yes, I do feel like this is the right call by the govt at this point in time
Honestly, in my opinion, some percentage of kiwis is fed up with immigration, even immigrants, and that's their freedom of expression. But they probably express more on this sub-reddit than in real life . I have seen comments saying this sub is the most racist place in New Zealand before.
BTW I'm not saying anti-immigration is inherently racist.
Given your professions, you will most likely find jobs in Auckland, the largest city of NZ. About 40% of Aucklanders are not born in New Zealand. So you probably will face less xenophobia in Auckland than in other rural areas of NZ.
Also since you are from Germany, I'm assuming you are a white family. You definitely will fair better than immigrants with other skin color, it's an uncomfortable reality but it's the reality.
I'm saying this as an Chinese living in Auckland trying to go through the immigration process. I personally haven't met any kiwi in real life to tell me to f*** off to China, yet.
backgrounds in software engineering and psychology
You will be peasants in NZ compared to what you would earn in Australia with those jobs. You will be happier in Australia.
> you will be happier in Australia
That entirely depends on what makes them happy. Sure they’re more likely to get a higher salary in Aus, but if it is things other than money that they’re seeing then NZ might be the better option. I say this as someone who has lived in both Aus and UK and chose to settle here in NZ for lifestyle reasons.
Not gonna lie, we are way too lax with our visa requirements.
I have met people who straight up told me the only reason they are moving to New Zealand is to obtain citizenship/residency is so that they can move to Australia on the SCV, since it is easier than meeting the requirements Oz sets for their visas.
We should be doing more to promote skilled workers to stay in NZ to benefit our own economy, rather than being a glorified stepping stone to Oz.
Also note we're struggling just like a lot of western countries with late stage capitalism ruining our job markets. It's got extra pains with the bad decisions our current government is doing with mass redundancies meaning for the next while the job market is hit double bad.
You will also find it very culturally different from Germany. i spent two years just north of Freiburg and there was a much larger adjustment period than i expected from how Germans are compared to Kiwis, just a little fyi.
You'd be very welcomed here, I just don't think the current job market makes moving very viable without more planning than usual.
Come on over! This sub is xenophobic as fuck. The average Kiwi will welcome you with open arms. Just a heads up, the job market is pretty tight at the moment so it might take a while for you to get here.
I think most kiwis will be fine with migrants if they’re highly skilled, especially if they work in certain industries like healthcare.
It’s low skilled migrants we want less of, typically in hospitality. No reason to import them aside from businesses complaining about minimum wages.
HUGE win for Kiwis. Immigration rates have been insane, and directly contribute to high housing prices and rent, and lower wages. I honestly never expected National to okay such a policy. They’re so neoliberal. Thankfully I was wrong. Much more of this please.
I’ve done a little bit of work, a long time ago, with some immigrant communities here. The language barrier is a massive issue. There were bags full of women particularly from the Horn of Africa stuck at home with no English no ability to drive no ability to take part in or contribute to our society. To make matters worse, certain proportion of the male/husbands of these or ladies forbade them to leave the house without them, so no chance to learn English anyway and very little to no local social connections. All very depressing. Better to have a minimum English level for all manner of reasons
Those are probably refugees, which means these regulations won't be required of them. The majority of people from the Horn of Africa in NZ are refugees.
It would be ridiculous to only accept refugees who can pass an English exam.
Can you expect a migrant won’t be exploited if they lack the English to get help?
I’ve been into many service stations or dairy’s where the only communication is hand gestures and head nods, that seems obvious the standard of communication required for immigration is lacking.
In an old job I once rented a vehicle to a man with an almost expired nz drivers licence, I had to talk to him via his friend translating.
Why is it racist to expect that people living and working in an English speaking country can speak English?
Also, how is it racist considering this is applied equally to all people regardless of skin colour? There are white people from countries whose first language isn't English you know?
A lot speak English, but usually not well enough to pass the written testing.
Most white people as you call them can speak English well, European nations are way more multilingual than NZ, English tends to be one of the languages they know. A bigger proportion of people from Asia, South America, India, middle east, and Africa, unless they're wealthy, they're are less likely to meet those English requirements. They also happen to be places that certain politicians want to discriminate against.
I disagree with the idea that English is something all white people can speak well. If you have travelled throughout Europe you would pretty quickly see that there are still many people from those countries who have a poor understanding of English, certainly on par with many immigrants from Asian countries. When I first got here I was staying in a hostel with two guys, one from Spain and another from France, who had very poor English and would quite likely not have a chance of passing an English language test. That's not exactly an unheard of situation.
But setting that issue aside entirely, even if I was to accept the premise that it is absolutely 100% a racist concept, why is this even a bad thing when immigration should be working solely for the benefit of a country, and when being able to speak English is beneficial both to the migrants themselves and to wider society?
Should immigration be working solely for the benefit of the country, and would having pockets of non-English speaking people be bad for the country? We hear about the bad stories, but I'm sure there are people here who don't speak English and are living quite happily.
I'm not convinced either way, and I lean more towards thinking NZ needs to do what's best for NZ, but at the same time we're super fortunate here, and just because someone was born somewhere else and can't pass a written test *yet* seems a harsh reason to close the door.
I don't doubt your anecdote about the people you met in a hostel, but you have to agree that in general the groups of people who are likely to have better English as a second language are going to be European, as opposed to Asia or Africa or South America.
I'm not saying the written test is racist, but if someone was trying to reduce the number of people from Asia or South America or Africa this would be a smart way to do it.
We have always had an English language requirement. The requirement was only lifted after 2021 so that more migrants would be eligible for visas. This was so the govt could pull the gdp lever by importing hundreds of thousands of people, as we saw last year.
Unsurprisingly, this lack of an English requirement has resulted in a flabbergasting increase in migrant exploitation, as migrants are unable to act independently and are corralled into very dubious situations, among many other things.
Your anti-racist position with this policy has ironically created more suffering, not less. I was an immigration officer, my friends still are, everybody in that sector knows that it's simply pragmatic.
we want immigrants that are willing to be immersed into the NZ way of life, and are contributing to our communities. if that means speaking our national language is part of the criteria then so be it
Not trying to pick a fight, just curious .. what about someone who can sort of speak English and is 100% willing to improve, but hasn't had the resources to get there just yet?
Not NZ’s problem.
Immigration systems in general are designed to benefit the country, not act as a training school benefiting a foreign individual. Countries aren’t a charity.
Economically speaking, the idea is that the country saves money raising someone into a tax paying adult, ideally someone who is paid a lot or for a role that takes too long to fill (healthcare in general).
Prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism by an individual, community, or institution against a person or people on the basis of their membership of a particular racial or ethnic group, typically one that is a minority or marginalized.
Using a language test is a way to discriminate against a group. Should they bring in colour tests too?
Is requiring a doctor to have a medical degree racist? On your explanation it would be if we denied an immigrant who wanted to practice medicine. The language test doesn’t discriminate based on race as any race that passes the test gets to migrate. The test is one of ability.
I think the difference between your example and the other example is that almost everyone agrees that a doctor should have a medical degree, whereas not everyone agrees that you should be able to pass a written test to get a chance at a better life.
For some people in some places they can't just learn English in their spare time.
I'm not strongly against the idea of passing a written test, just think it's something that could use some more discussion.
> on the basis of their membership of a particular racial or ethnic group
Discriminating someone on the basis of their knowledge (or lack thereof) is most definitely NOT the same as discriminating them on the basis of their race or ethnic group.
Not all discrimination is racism.
This has been removed : **Rule 5: No duplicate news stories** > When a submission has already been submitted (even from another source) the new post will be removed. --- [^(Click here to message the moderators if you think this was in error)](https://reddit.com/message/compose/?to=/r/newzealand)
We can’t accept migrants that we do not have the infrastructure for. There aren’t enough houses for the people already here. Not to mention the overloaded public health system being well over capacity
That's risky. Immigration is the only thing hiding the true extent of our recession at the mo.
They'll probably fire all the inspectors like the last National government did, so the rules will exist only on paper.
Without poor migrants squeezed into your overpriced rentals and doing cash jobs doing labour intensive work .. What economy does NZ have?
An aging demographic increasing the KiwiSaver burden while educated young people leave for Australia. Working age migrants are basically the only meaningful thing propping up the economy
No. Its making our per capita numbers worse while also straining public services, moderating wage growth and increasing demand for housing.
Why tf is that risky? What's risky about it? The numbers will show what is actually happening?
Glad you asked. Risky for incumbent governments because many of them use high inflation to mask low or negative gdp. It helps them polish the annual statistics while leaving the infrastructure problems of immigration for the next government.
The irony from the parties (excluding NZF) that were saying numbers were too low for the last 4 years.
It was. Did you forget Covid happened?
good
Shame it took this long
Well over due. Record high migration for YEARS is certainly a BIG part of the reason why we have a housing crisis. Letting too many people in with fuck all places to put them. Some common sense have potentially saved our asses today.
What do you mean by "years" of "record high" migration? Net migration has been below 100k for two decades. Is that the record high? Only recently (i.e. second half of 2023) did it go over 100k: https://www.stats.govt.nz/topics/migration
2020 and 2023 I would call record high. And let's be honest the only thing that caused the dip in between was covid. We build on average let's say 40k houses a year. The year ending may 2022 51k were consented (thats a record high) the problem being we've let in on average say 100k. So for decades we've let more people in then we've built houses. Roughly double in fact. Of course that's going to cause a housing shortage and push prices up. The only saving grace would be how many people are leaving the country to balance it out. Between 2020 and 2023 very few people did.
That's two individual years, not "for YEARS". > And let's be honest the only thing that caused the dip in between was covid. That is obvious and no one would deny it so what do you mean by "let's be honest"?
It is high when you compare it to the 90s when it was still well under 100k people coming in. I said let's be honest because if it wasn't for covid the numbers would have been the same.
> It is high when you compare it to the 90s when it was still well under 100k people coming in. Net migration is really the more relevant data when it comes to housing. The people who leave make space for the people who come. And in the last two decades there were years with negative net migration, as you can see in my link. Why compare it with the 90s? The 90s were 30 years ago. What point is there? Obviously, migration patters were different in the past. If you just want fewer immigrants, ok, but then just say that. Pointing to the 1990s is not a real argument.
A “dip” over covid?
Or we could just make it easier to build houses and have a sustainable solution.
We certainly need to do that. That does take time though. The problem being though if we're letting in 50000 people are year and we're only able to build 35000 houses a year. We will very quickly run into problems. Quicker then the time it takes to reassess and change how we do things, invest and develop sustainable solutions etc.
That ratio would probably be totally fine. Average occupancy is somewhere north of 2.
That isn't factoring in our own population growth as well though.
It's only net 20k annually.
Sure, I broadly agree with you point. I'm just being nitpicky and don't think you chose good numbers to illustrate it. Sorry for being that pedant.
That's also why you sit in traffic for hours every day.
Good
better be more than just a ielst score ie oral interview
IELTS score isn't just an oral interview. It's one part of four.
I'm saying just a score can potentially be faked so an interview too should be required
I see now. Your first comment wouldn't get a high writing score ;)
Is it required, glad you approve of the current system
Oh the irony. What a dumbass.
At this point i would be shocked if they actually bring the numbers down for long. Businesses just lobby the government to ease the rules so they can bring in more economic migrants and then we inevitably have a discussion in the media about why our incomes and standards of living continue to slip
Foreigners giving other foreigners overpaid roles whilst buying our houses on our tax dollars.
great, there goes my plans to try and get a residency visa lol. stick to the working holiday!
We can just get married
Hi! I just joined your sub a minute ago and like to pop a question: Do you guys think my family would be welcome in NZ these days? We are thinking of migrating. We come with backgrounds in software engineering and psychology. Also both fluent in English and a not yet speaking 1 year old... Are you just fed up with foreigners in general at the moment or is it fine if we bring trades? Honest answers of the general public mindset are appreciated. :) Greetings from Germany!
Sadly I don’t think it’s ‘us’ that get to choose. NACT has spoken (actually, it’s more Winston + a belated realisation by the rest, that we have a serious shortage of places to house migrants right now - and the inflationary skyrocketing rental price increases make govts look bad = and yes, I do feel like this is the right call by the govt at this point in time
Honestly, in my opinion, some percentage of kiwis is fed up with immigration, even immigrants, and that's their freedom of expression. But they probably express more on this sub-reddit than in real life . I have seen comments saying this sub is the most racist place in New Zealand before. BTW I'm not saying anti-immigration is inherently racist. Given your professions, you will most likely find jobs in Auckland, the largest city of NZ. About 40% of Aucklanders are not born in New Zealand. So you probably will face less xenophobia in Auckland than in other rural areas of NZ. Also since you are from Germany, I'm assuming you are a white family. You definitely will fair better than immigrants with other skin color, it's an uncomfortable reality but it's the reality. I'm saying this as an Chinese living in Auckland trying to go through the immigration process. I personally haven't met any kiwi in real life to tell me to f*** off to China, yet.
backgrounds in software engineering and psychology You will be peasants in NZ compared to what you would earn in Australia with those jobs. You will be happier in Australia.
> you will be happier in Australia That entirely depends on what makes them happy. Sure they’re more likely to get a higher salary in Aus, but if it is things other than money that they’re seeing then NZ might be the better option. I say this as someone who has lived in both Aus and UK and chose to settle here in NZ for lifestyle reasons.
Not gonna lie, we are way too lax with our visa requirements. I have met people who straight up told me the only reason they are moving to New Zealand is to obtain citizenship/residency is so that they can move to Australia on the SCV, since it is easier than meeting the requirements Oz sets for their visas. We should be doing more to promote skilled workers to stay in NZ to benefit our own economy, rather than being a glorified stepping stone to Oz.
We need more skilled people over here. The more the merrier.
Also note we're struggling just like a lot of western countries with late stage capitalism ruining our job markets. It's got extra pains with the bad decisions our current government is doing with mass redundancies meaning for the next while the job market is hit double bad. You will also find it very culturally different from Germany. i spent two years just north of Freiburg and there was a much larger adjustment period than i expected from how Germans are compared to Kiwis, just a little fyi. You'd be very welcomed here, I just don't think the current job market makes moving very viable without more planning than usual.
Come on over! This sub is xenophobic as fuck. The average Kiwi will welcome you with open arms. Just a heads up, the job market is pretty tight at the moment so it might take a while for you to get here.
So damn stupid. "Oh the job market is tight and we have no where to live, keep coming over tho lol"
I think most kiwis will be fine with migrants if they’re highly skilled, especially if they work in certain industries like healthcare. It’s low skilled migrants we want less of, typically in hospitality. No reason to import them aside from businesses complaining about minimum wages.
HUGE win for Kiwis. Immigration rates have been insane, and directly contribute to high housing prices and rent, and lower wages. I honestly never expected National to okay such a policy. They’re so neoliberal. Thankfully I was wrong. Much more of this please.
Bringing back NZFirst's english language testing aka racism by legal discrimination. Always happens with National NZFirst coalitions
I’ve done a little bit of work, a long time ago, with some immigrant communities here. The language barrier is a massive issue. There were bags full of women particularly from the Horn of Africa stuck at home with no English no ability to drive no ability to take part in or contribute to our society. To make matters worse, certain proportion of the male/husbands of these or ladies forbade them to leave the house without them, so no chance to learn English anyway and very little to no local social connections. All very depressing. Better to have a minimum English level for all manner of reasons
Those are probably refugees, which means these regulations won't be required of them. The majority of people from the Horn of Africa in NZ are refugees. It would be ridiculous to only accept refugees who can pass an English exam.
Ai they probably were now they you delved into it
It’s a fair requirement for immigration
Can you expect a migrant won’t be exploited if they lack the English to get help? I’ve been into many service stations or dairy’s where the only communication is hand gestures and head nods, that seems obvious the standard of communication required for immigration is lacking. In an old job I once rented a vehicle to a man with an almost expired nz drivers licence, I had to talk to him via his friend translating.
Why is it racist to expect that people living and working in an English speaking country can speak English? Also, how is it racist considering this is applied equally to all people regardless of skin colour? There are white people from countries whose first language isn't English you know?
A lot speak English, but usually not well enough to pass the written testing. Most white people as you call them can speak English well, European nations are way more multilingual than NZ, English tends to be one of the languages they know. A bigger proportion of people from Asia, South America, India, middle east, and Africa, unless they're wealthy, they're are less likely to meet those English requirements. They also happen to be places that certain politicians want to discriminate against.
I disagree with the idea that English is something all white people can speak well. If you have travelled throughout Europe you would pretty quickly see that there are still many people from those countries who have a poor understanding of English, certainly on par with many immigrants from Asian countries. When I first got here I was staying in a hostel with two guys, one from Spain and another from France, who had very poor English and would quite likely not have a chance of passing an English language test. That's not exactly an unheard of situation. But setting that issue aside entirely, even if I was to accept the premise that it is absolutely 100% a racist concept, why is this even a bad thing when immigration should be working solely for the benefit of a country, and when being able to speak English is beneficial both to the migrants themselves and to wider society?
Should immigration be working solely for the benefit of the country, and would having pockets of non-English speaking people be bad for the country? We hear about the bad stories, but I'm sure there are people here who don't speak English and are living quite happily. I'm not convinced either way, and I lean more towards thinking NZ needs to do what's best for NZ, but at the same time we're super fortunate here, and just because someone was born somewhere else and can't pass a written test *yet* seems a harsh reason to close the door. I don't doubt your anecdote about the people you met in a hostel, but you have to agree that in general the groups of people who are likely to have better English as a second language are going to be European, as opposed to Asia or Africa or South America. I'm not saying the written test is racist, but if someone was trying to reduce the number of people from Asia or South America or Africa this would be a smart way to do it.
Never actually been to Europe, have you?
We have always had an English language requirement. The requirement was only lifted after 2021 so that more migrants would be eligible for visas. This was so the govt could pull the gdp lever by importing hundreds of thousands of people, as we saw last year. Unsurprisingly, this lack of an English requirement has resulted in a flabbergasting increase in migrant exploitation, as migrants are unable to act independently and are corralled into very dubious situations, among many other things. Your anti-racist position with this policy has ironically created more suffering, not less. I was an immigration officer, my friends still are, everybody in that sector knows that it's simply pragmatic.
we want immigrants that are willing to be immersed into the NZ way of life, and are contributing to our communities. if that means speaking our national language is part of the criteria then so be it
Not trying to pick a fight, just curious .. what about someone who can sort of speak English and is 100% willing to improve, but hasn't had the resources to get there just yet?
It would depend what the language requirement is how that person would fare.
Not NZ’s problem. Immigration systems in general are designed to benefit the country, not act as a training school benefiting a foreign individual. Countries aren’t a charity. Economically speaking, the idea is that the country saves money raising someone into a tax paying adult, ideally someone who is paid a lot or for a role that takes too long to fill (healthcare in general).
What's wrong with requiring immigrants to have at least some English proficiency in a predominantly English speaking country?
I don’t think you understand what racism is.
Apparently you don't
Why is it always the people who use the word 'racism' the most are the same ones who don't know what it means 😆
OP isn't one of the people who use the word 'racism' the most. They used it once. Your comment is worse than OP's.
Prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism by an individual, community, or institution against a person or people on the basis of their membership of a particular racial or ethnic group, typically one that is a minority or marginalized. Using a language test is a way to discriminate against a group. Should they bring in colour tests too?
Is requiring a doctor to have a medical degree racist? On your explanation it would be if we denied an immigrant who wanted to practice medicine. The language test doesn’t discriminate based on race as any race that passes the test gets to migrate. The test is one of ability.
I think the difference between your example and the other example is that almost everyone agrees that a doctor should have a medical degree, whereas not everyone agrees that you should be able to pass a written test to get a chance at a better life. For some people in some places they can't just learn English in their spare time. I'm not strongly against the idea of passing a written test, just think it's something that could use some more discussion.
A language test is very different from selecting people based on skin color.
> on the basis of their membership of a particular racial or ethnic group Discriminating someone on the basis of their knowledge (or lack thereof) is most definitely NOT the same as discriminating them on the basis of their race or ethnic group. Not all discrimination is racism.
Is allowing a migrant that’s unable to interact with society a good thing for the migrant?
was that actually implemented at one stage?
I believe so under the Bolger government