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Home > Archive > General Discussion > May 2004 > Get paid to have babies
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Get paid to have babies
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| KiwiPete 2004-05-11, 4:12 pm |
| Only in Australia...
Australians urged to do it for their country
12.05.2004 7.22 am
CANBERRA - Australian couples owe it to their country to
have have more children and should get on with the job, the nation's treasurer said on Tuesday.
"You go home and do your patriotic duty tonight," Peter Costello said when asked by a journalist if he was "the family-friendly treasurer saying get out there and procreate".
In a federal budget handed down on Tuesday, Costello promised $A3000 ($NZ3482) for every baby born after June as part of a A$19.2 billion "family package" to be distributed over five years.
Costello said two youngsters per couple in the nation of 20 million just wasn't adequate.
"If you can have children it's a good thing to do. You should have...one for your husband, one for your wife, and one for your country," Costello said.
"If you want to fix the ageing demographic, you're just back to square after two. You make no net improvement," the former-lawyer and father-of-three said.
Some would have to go one step further by having extra children "for your country" to make up the gap left by friends who "aren't even replicating themselves," the Treasurer said.
- REUTERS | |
| Freddy 2004-05-11, 4:53 pm |
| Haven't these people ever heard of over-population problems? According to the WHO we are massively overcrowded now. | |
| bsdboy 2004-05-11, 5:01 pm |
| australia isnt. lots of open space there. | |
| enforcer 2004-05-11, 5:31 pm |
| quote:
Originally posted by bsdboy
australia isnt. lots of open space there.
That's coz most of them come over here.  |
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