Former Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has heaped praise on the anti-immigration policy of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban while warning a demographic conference in Europe about “military age” male immigrants “swarming” the continent, reported The Guardian.
The former Australian Prime Minister’s lecture at the Budapest forum: "Immigration: What Europe can learn from Australia," was part of a wider debate moderated by Mark Higgie, who was Australia's ambassador to the European Union and Abbott's international advisor.
As he applauded the central European country’s immigration and population policies, Abbot - a guest of honour at the Hungarian government-backed summit on demography - focused on what European countries could learn from Australian immigration policy.
Abbot claimed the left was seeking to undermine western society with migration and the “climate cult.”
“The vast majority of migrants did not come to Australia to change us but to join us. There were the British or the Irish coming in our first 100 years. They changed us but for the better, in – for instance – the artistic sense. The problem with the people who have been swarming across the borders in Europe in very recent times is that you don’t get any impression that they come to join. You get the impression they come to change,” said Abbot.
“I mean … you get a million angry military-age males swarming into a single country in a year. They are not there to be grateful, they are there with a grievance,” added Abbot.
The Australian Prime Minister also targeted some barbed criticism at the UK’s Prince Harry and Meghan, Duchess of Sussex, for remarks that they would not have more than two children due to the effects on the environment.
“Having fewer children in western countries will hardly make the climate better when so many children are being born elsewhere,” said the former Australian leader.
Abbot vehemently praised the nativist policies of Hungary’s Prime Minister Victor Orban, who promotes boosting the Hungarian population while fiercely resisting immigration.
“I think he is perfectly entitled to take that focus. As a general rule I am all in favour of families with children, said the Australian politician.
The former MP emphasised his host’s “political courage to defy political correctness,” adding that declining populations were the true “extinction rebellion.”
When asked whether he had advised the Hungarian government, Abbott said: "It's not up to me to advise the government … But yes, the Hungarian and Australian migration policies are very aligned."
He also supported Orban's attempt to encourage couples to have more babies with financial incentives.
Victor Orban had opened the conference on Thursday deploring the population decline in Europe while touting Hungary's family policy.
It was conceivable, said Orban, that Hungary, with a population of just under 10 million and shrinking because of plummeting birthrates and emigration to EU states further west, could just disappear.
“If Europe is not going to be populated by Europeans in the future and we take this as given, then we are speaking about an exchange of populations, to replace the population of Europeans with others. There are political forces in Europe who want a replacement of population for ideological or other reasons,” said the Hungarian leader.
