A desirable target for the permanent population of New Zealand should be more than the current 4 million ?

On average, everyone agrees with significant nonconsensus between 222 voters.

Reasons To Disagree

NZ is already overcrowded. The infrastructure of immigrant magnets like Auckland are already massively overloaded. Traffic gridlock. Electricity. Water. All natural and City resources, all overloaded and causing us Kiwis untold strife. NZ is already too full. We were happiest and wealthiest when we had a population of two and a half to three million.

The desirability of NZ is the lack of people here, not more.

I disagree at the moment because the government seems to want to boost the numbers with people who need work done on them to bring them up to speed or who fundamentally don't want to take an active part in western society and will become a problem in the future, as is happening now in Britain. New Zealand is not wealthy enough for free lunches.

The number is completely immaterial - all we want is a homogenous mix of happy, intelligent people.

A bigger population increases the risk of over-using our resources, further deforestation and development of our natural areas, greater carbon emmissions and therefore global warming, more cars on the road etc

Why ,for more to go on the dole ? ...If all the babies aborted in this country were here who would need all these people to make up the numbers ?

SPACE - you won't appreciate it if it's gone.

Why more NZ used to be a great place. Even though we have big open spaces all this land actualy belongs to someone. Our presant infrastructure is strugling with our current population.

Nonsense. It is very small !! The population is too small for a country !

What makes us happy? Beaches, space, virgin land, clean water, family, a car, a house.. Why do we need more people to achieve the above? Our infrastructure is fine. I can call my mum. I can drive the length of the country. We already have enough petty little dramas with 4 million of us. More people = more clash of preference. More diversity also = more clash of preference.

A Balanced Dynamic Equilibrium is the only way for a sustainable future, we cant just keep growing for ever the world is only so big????? It is through population growth that Corporate greed flourish. We all need to make sacrifices and focus on Sustainable COMMUNITY'S rather than Capitilisation and Profitering!!!

Reasons To Agree

New Zealand ould easily benefit from more people. Since our birth rate is now below replacement without immigration we will dissapear. also we are a nation of imigrants, Maori, and Every other Kiwi is an immigrant. Such increase would make us develop our infrastructure and build a better NZ. Why is all our development in Auckland ? Mostly due to reaching critical mass. Other cities like Tauranga, Hamilton and Area's like Palmerston North could benefit from skilled migrants. Auckland problems are aucklands alone. The rest of NZ needs more population to allow it to develop.

Too much of the country is un-inhabited and we need more people to boost the economy.

According to the latest stats from STATSNZ NZ will reach 5 million in 2025 and 6 million in 2045 or 2050. If immigration continues but yes if you want the economy to grow then you must bring more people here or have more people, births have been increasing over a few years but this must be sustained above replacement level of 2.1 children per woman

economy needs people, NZ is still a well undeveloped country even it said to be developed.... even compare with many third world countries, NZ is still way back........ we need more population to get economy going well.......

But not too much more.

We should aim to increase the population to 21 million with this spread around 144 across the country, all new arrivals should pay a development fee of about $50000 and would not be eligible for Government Assisted Income - they should take there own welfare-retirement cover, pay towards a percentage of income on education, an extra 15% tax on income to offset any job losses.

depends, needs to be more economically viable for NZ people. Stop too many Asians

New zealand has room to grow, but the current housing crisis shows we have not developed the required infrastructure for this yet.

Our country is still small, and if you've noticed, all the best countries out there are the ones with the most citizens, and the only way of getting NZ to a high point is by getting a bigger population.