By Clyde Sharady | Editor in Chief
You can tell a lot about a country by looking at its main street.
Walk down most commercial areas in the suburbs of Melbourne, Sydney, Brisbane or other major Australian cities and you notice one thing: a Greek bakery sits next to a Vietnamese noodle shop. Get on the train in peak hours you notice a nurse from Sudan returning home after her shift at the hospital, an engineer from India, a financial adviser from Zimbabwe or a bricklayer from the Philippines etc…. Nearly half of all Australians were born overseas or have a parent who was. That is not something wrong with Australia. That is Australia, the real one that everyone can see, not the “true-blue” Australia that some people carry in their minds.
Some people say that migrants “want to replace you.” It is not true. It is a frightening story, and frightening stories are good at spreading.
Nobody is plotting anything. The people arriving want what every family wants: a safe home, a decent job, and a better life for their children. The Italians and Greeks who came after the war wanted the same. People said they would never fit in. Now we eat their food, cheer for their footballers, and cannot picture Australia without them. The same happened with the Lebanese, the Vietnamese and many others. Each time, the fear was wrong.
A glimpse of the young people of Australia in 2026
History is full of this pattern. Every generation finds someone new to be afraid of, and every generation later feels a little ashamed of it. We would do well to learn the lesson early this time, instead of waiting fifty years to say sorry.
What do newcomers give to Australia ?
Australia is growing older. More people are retiring and fewer young people are coming up behind them. Someone has to nurse the sick, care for the elderly, build the houses and mend the roads.
Many migrants arrive young and ready to work. They pay taxes, start businesses, and give other people jobs. They pick the fruit, drive the trucks, teach in the classrooms and staff the hospital wards. A country that shuts its doors is like a farmer who stops planting because he fears a poor harvest. He ends up with nothing.
Look also at what they bring beyond work. New food, new music, new ways of seeing the world and definitely new steam in our economic engine. A country is richer when many kinds of people share it. There is an old African saying: “a table is not rich for the dishes upon it, but for the hands that share them.” Australia is richer and more enjoyable thanks to the many people who share it and call it home.
Aren’t homes too expensive now because of migrants?
Homes are too expensive, and that is a real worry. Young people cannot rent, let alone buy. Their anger is fair.
But look at who made it this way. Not the newcomers. Governments made choices over many years. They made it easy for investors to buy up investment houses, but they let public housing shrink. They were ans still are quite slow to approve new buildings. Blaming migrants for this is like blaming the last person in the queue for how long the queue is. The answer is to build more homes and make the rules fairer. Sending people away will not necessarily lower the rent.
And remember who builds the houses. Much of the building industry depends on migrant workers. Drive them out and the homes we need will take even longer to appear and probably cost more.
A pamphlet for a pro-migrant rally in Sydney scheduled on 8 November 2026
Shall we just open the doors and let in everyone who wants to come to Australia ?
I am not saying we should open the gates without a plan. A wise country thinks ahead. It makes sure there are enough homes, schools and hospitals. It helps newcomers learn English and get their qualifications recognised, so a trained doctor is not stuck washing dishes. It stops bosses from cheating migrant workers, because cheated workers drag down wages for everyone. And it shows mercy to refugees fleeing danger.
Good people can disagree about how many we should welcome each year. That is healthy. That is how a democracy works.
But saying “let us talk about numbers” is one thing. Saying “send them back” or “we want a white Australia” or ‘We need remigration ” is another. The first is a debate. The second is racism, and we should call it by its name.
What to do?
Think of a child at school hearing that people like their mother and father do not belong. No child should carry that. Words spoken at a rally do not stay at the rally. They follow people onto buses, into shops and across playgrounds. At times they stay in people’s heads for decades. This is why Australians need to stand up against racism and far right ideas that want to plant fear on people’s minds regarding migrants in the country.
Australia chose a better path before. We ended the White Australia Policy. We became a place where people from every corner of the world could call this home. We should not walk backwards now.
Some who spread these messages have not thought about the harm they do. Others know exactly what they are doing. Either way, the answer is the same: stand up, speak up, and be kind.
A country does not grow strong by shrinking its circle. It grows strong when everyone inside it knows they belong.
