And what does our infrastructure guru recommend? Her report suggests that more people should be encouraged to move to Wollongong and Newcastle. So there you have it. Fuelled by the demands of the developers, ordinary citizens are being told to get out of town to be replaced by wealthier new arrivals. Fine for rich people like me, but deeply unfair for most. Do any of us really want to live in a city of 8 million? That’s where we are told Sydney is headed by mid-century, as if it's a foregone conclusion. Yet no one in power seems prepared to answer a simple question: why? Why are doing this, who benefits and who asked us if this is a good idea? I am yet to see a convincing argument that proves more is better for the majority of people. In 1998 under John Howard, the Australian Bureau of Statistics predicted we would have a population in 2051 of about 24.9 million. Well, we have already exceeded that number 33 years ahead of schedule which tells you a lot about the quality of long term planning in Australia.

This has mostly happened because successive governments have allowed our immigration figures to rise out of control. Pushed by the growth lobby, and in the absence of a real debate or plan, the politicians have encouraged a massive expansion of our immigration program without seeking our permission. Peak hour begins at Town Hall station. Will public transport keep up with population growth? Credit:Ryan Stuart It is staggering that while every Australian family will have a plan for the size of their family, our governments don’t have a population plan for the country. Gone are the days when we needed more and more people to make things in factories. Now with automation, robotics and artificial intelligence, the jobs of the past are rapidly disappearing. We need to prepare for this future, not rest on the lazy economics that relies on a rapidly growing population to keep our economy afloat. Federal Treasurer Scott Morrison says a Big Australia means a bigger economy. But he fails to mention that in slicing up the economic pie between more and more people, we are actually going backwards in our quality of life. We are well beyond the sweet spot that allows us to plan for sensible development.

It is amazing that none of the major political parties reflect what most Australians want. Yes, I can understand why. They are sensitive to the developers who fund them, and also of being labelled as "xenophobic" or "racist". Yet the problem we are creating affect everyone - new arrivals and old. We are conducting a risky experiment that has no parallel among developed nations, with a population growth rate that exceeds most developing countries. But none of this is inevitable. We can all have a say in our future and it starts with a proper plan for where we want to be. We should bring our immigration down to the long-term average of about 70,000 per year (as it was during the time of Hawke and Keating) while keeping a generous allocation for refugees. This would stabilise our population at about 30 million, not the 100 million we are heading for now. Others may disagree, but sooner or later we have to accept that there are limits to growth for our city and our nation. And the decisions need to happen now, not delayed so that our grandchildren are left with the consequences. Dick Smith is a businessman.