The latest ABS net migration figures expose the misuse of Net Permanent and Long-term movement data by media outlets and anti-immigration campaigners seeking to inflate claims about Australia’s migration intake.
The Institute of Public Affairs (IPA) has been leading a 12-month campaign to misuse Net Permanent and Long-term (NPLT) data starting with an article in The Australian in mid-2025 by the IPA’s Chief Economist, Adam Creighton, who said:
“The Government promised to cut net immigration back to sustainable, pre-COVID levels before the Election, which would imply around 250,000 a year, where it had hovered for years. For this calendar year, it’s on track to exceed 550,000.”
On Twitter, Crieghton argued that net migration in 2025 would be between 550,000 and 598,000.
As recently as last week, Creighton was still saying NPLT is essentially a measure of Australia’s immigration intake. It isn’t.
On 18 June 2026, the ABS released data on net migration for 2025. The 2025 net migration outcome of 301,000 was 249,000 to 297,000 lower than Creighton’s forecast. It was around 180,000 lower than NPLT for 2025 which was 480,720.
The IPA misinformation campaign has been so extensive that the Liberal Party also misused NPLT data to argue immigration levels are ‘exploding’. Not surprisingly, Pauline Hanson followed suit in misusing NPLT data. Just last week, the Daily Telegraph was still telling us that NPLT is the same as Australia’s ‘immigration intake’. Nothing could be further from the truth. NPLT is neither the permanent intake nor is it net migration.
In response to my criticisms of the IPA’s misinformation campaign, a small anti-immigration website known as MacroBusiness has come to the IPA’s defence largely by attacking me rather than providing any actual evidence or analysis. Without corroborating evidence, NPLT data can be highly misleading. The ABS has warned accordingly but its warnings have been ignored or even attacked. In the last two years, NPLT has significantly diverged from net migration (see Table 1).
Will the most recent net migration data published by the ABS be enough to deter the IPA from its misinformation campaign based on NPLT data? Will it deter media outlets like the Daily Telegraph and Ben Fordham on 2GB from misusing NPLT data? Will it deter the Liberal Party and One Nation from their misuse of this data?
Sadly, I doubt it.
Abul Rizvi PhD was a senior official in the Department of Immigration from the early 1990s to 2007 when he left as Deputy Secretary. He was awarded the Public Service Medal and the Centenary Medal for services to development and implementation of immigration policy, including the reshaping of Australia’s intake to focus on skilled migration, slow Australia’s rate of population ageing and boost Australia’s international education and tourism industries.