At 31 August 2026 there were 2,878,973 people in Australia on temporary visas. Take out New Zealand citizens, visitors and crew, and 1,825,403 remain. Every one of them needs somewhere to live, and so does everyone already here. In Victoria, the government has decided the answer is to build up in established suburbs, whether the people living there like it or not. The real question is why it has to happen this fast.
What changed in Victoria?
Since April, Victoria has had new planning rules called "deemed to comply".
In plain terms: if a new building ticks the government's boxes, it gets approved. Neighbours cannot object, and they cannot appeal.
The Planning Minister, Sonya Kilkenny, put it simply. If a development meets the standards, she said, "there is no capacity to object to that and they will be approved".
What does that look like on a real street?
In Armadale, in Melbourne's south-east, a developer wants to knock down five single-storey units on Mercer Road and put up a six-storey block.
Dave Corrigan lives across the road. He called the plan outrageous. "I could probably understand on a main road and High Street," he told the ABC's 7.30, "but in the middle of Mercer Road, that's just ridiculous."
Under the new rules, his objection carries little weight, and his right to appeal is gone.
The local mayor, Melina Sehr, summed up what residents are left with. "They either sell or just put up with it."
How much building is the government planning?
A lot. Labor says Victoria needs about 2.24 million extra homes by 2051.
At least 70 per cent of those are meant to go into areas that are already built up. That means suburbs people chose for their quiet streets and backyards are now the main place the growth has to go.
Is everyone against it?
No, and it is worth being fair about that.
In Box Hill, Danny Todica lives in a 30-storey tower and loves the convenience. "People still need to live somewhere," he told the ABC.
Phil Ward has lived in Box Hill for 47 years. He once fought the towers, then bought into one. He likes the shops and transport too, but says the change has come at a cost: traffic, and green space under pressure. "It only takes a little glitch and all of a sudden gridlock," he said.
Both of them are right. Density can work. The question is who decides how much, and how fast.
So are you against new housing?
No. That is the obvious objection, and it deserves a straight answer.
Homes need to be built. But how much a suburb has to change, and how quickly, depends on how fast the population grows. And population growth is not something a council or a state planning minister sets. It is set in Canberra, mostly by the size of the migration intake.
Our housing capacity page shows what that has meant nationally: the population has been growing faster than the homes to hold it. Every year that continues, the pressure lands on streets like Mercer Road.
Slow the growth, and the same suburbs can change at a pace the people living there can live with.
Why is the intake still so high?
The usual answer is that Australia is short of workers. That answer is getting weaker.
The government's own shortage list, updated this week, found only 27 per cent of the jobs it checked are now short of workers, well down on 2023. Some of the jobs falling off are ones software now does, like software testing.
So suburbs are being rezoned to make room for an intake sized for a labour shortage that is shrinking. Nobody in Melbourne voted for that trade.
Who is offering residents a say?
The Victorian Liberals. Opposition Leader Jess Wilson says "local communities should have a say in how their community grows", and that a Coalition government would push high-rise towards the CBD and inner city instead of imposing density targets on established suburbs.
That is the right instinct. It treats the people already living somewhere as the ones with the most at stake.
And who would slow the growth itself?
That decision sits federally, and One Nation is the party with the clearest plan. It would cut the temporary migrant population by 750,000 over three years.
That is why One Nation should lead the next federal government, with the Liberals and the Nationals supporting it. The Liberals are standing up for residents' say over their own streets. One Nation would take the pressure off those streets in the first place.
Dave Corrigan should not have to choose between selling and putting up with it. A slower, steadier pace of growth would give him, and suburbs like his, a third option.
For the national numbers, see our pages on the temporary visa population and housing capacity.