Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke’s cancelling of his big speech on migration that had been scheduled for delivery at the National Press Club on Thursday was embarrassing but also revealing.

Obviously, Burke was unable to finish the work on time. He didn’t want to deliver a speech with glaring holes that had to be filled later. Reportedly, there were arguments when the policy outline was discussed by cabinet ministers on Monday.

One thing the delay tells us is just how hard it is to put together a good migration policy. Remember, the government commissioned an expert review of migration, led by former senior bureaucrat Martin Parkinson, undertaken soon after it won office. It was concluded in early 2023. Yet that blueprint was not effectively implemented by then home affairs minister Clare O'Neil and then immigration minister Andrew Giles.

What this week’s toing and froing also signals is that the government knows making more drastic changes to immigration to bring it under control is now a strong political imperative.

For some time, Labor could push back against the Coalition over immigration – the opposition has only partially released its own policy – and attack One Nation’s ultra hard line. But those tactics only divert attention for so long.

The government’s medium term objective is to reduce the Net Overseas Migration (NOM) number to an annual 225,000, way below the present level of around 300,000. The NOM is “the net gain or loss of population through international migration to and from Australia”. (The NOM has its technical limitations as a measure, but that’s another story.)

Net overseas migration, for years ending 30 June

Particularly given Labor’s increasing concern that One Nation could erode its vote, it has to match the NOM........

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