I don’t speak the bureaucratic jargon used in Canberra, so sometimes the bureaucrats struggle to grasp a straightforward question in plain English. It took some time for the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) to understand my question, which was about our high migrant intake from a health perspective.
For years, Australians were mandated to get vaccinated. They couldn’t access certain places or participate in activities without being vaccinated. The latest COVID mandates were only lifted for firefighters and healthcare workers just last month.
The ABS is responsible for maintaining official records on these matters, particularly provisional and final mortality reports. I asked whether they have records of the vaccination status of new arrivals so that vaccination rates of all Australians (both new and existing) could be graphed against known health outcomes. I sort of received a response, but the reality is the ABS does not know the vaccination status of the 2.3 million new arrivals, rendering any data they generate inherently inaccurate. This also applies to births by vaccination status, suggesting that new arrivals from countries where vaccination wasn’t pushed have a higher birth rate compared to vaccinated Australians.
This data is really important for two main reasons: first, to understand the harm our COVID response did to Australians and second, to assist in the planning and resourcing of the next response. I will continue questioning the accuracy and relevance of ABS data.
Transcript
CHAIR: I might share the call and come back. Senator Roberts.
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you for appearing again. It’s good to see you, Dr Gruen. Do you know the COVID vaccination status of the 2.3 million new arrivals under the current government? Is that data you’re provided with?
Dr Gruen: No, I don’t think we know the vaccination status of immigrants—at least, not that I’m aware.
Senator ROBERTS: I didn’t think so. It’s just striking that we locked down the whole population and mandated a shot that’s still experimental—in fact, for some people it’s still mandated—yet we’re letting people in without any question.
Senator Gallagher: Senator Roberts, there isn’t a mandatory vaccination program now in the country. It’s a voluntary vaccination program.
Senator ROBERTS: No, there are still some states and employers that are doing it.
Senator Gallagher: As a requirement of their employment?
Senator ROBERTS: Yes.
Senator Gallagher: Well, the Commonwealth vaccination program is a voluntary program.
Senator ROBERTS: Not if you’re in the Department of Defence, Australian Electoral Commission or aged care. It doesn’t exist anymore—I accept that—but it was never voluntary. If someone on a temporary visa, people who can be here for 20 years, has a baby, does that count as a domestic birth?
Dr Gruen: I’m not quite sure. You mean it’s a birth in this country?
Senator ROBERTS: Yes. I’m sorry; I didn’t make that clear. People can be here for 20 years on a temporary visa. If they have a baby while they’re in Australia, does that count as a domestic birth?
Dr Gruen: I’m not sure that we have a category called ‘domestic births’.
Senator ROBERTS: So they’re all lumped in?
Dr Gruen: No, I’m just saying that I’d have to look at exactly what the categories are in our birth data. I haven’t got our birth data with us.
Senator ROBERTS: Could you take that on notice, please?
Dr Gruen: Certainly.
Senator ROBERTS: If we got a temporary arrival in this country who was not vaccinated and had a baby, they could be providing an inaccurate picture of the Australian domestic birthrate post COVID. If there’s a problem—and some gynaecologists are saying that there certainly is—then that would be covering up a decrease in the birthrate.
Dr Gruen: I don’t think I understand. Most people are free not to get vaccinated if they choose, whether they’re immigrants or whether they live here.
Senator ROBERTS: There are studies and also anecdotal reports of a significant decrease in birthrate.
Dr Gruen: I think we’ve had this discussion before, when you were suggesting that the birthrate in December had plummeted, and we explained to you that that was preliminary data. I think I said to you at the time that people who give birth have got other things on their mind than making sure that their reports are up to date with births, deaths and marriages. As we demonstrated to you at the time, there is no decline in birthrate in December. That was simply a function of looking at preliminary data, and, when the data was more complete, that effect went away.
Senator ROBERTS: Yes, I understand that. But, if we don’t trap immigrants by their vaccination status and they have a baby here, then it could be covering up any decrease in birthrate.
Dr Gruen: We measure the birthrate.
Senator ROBERTS: If we’re bringing in foreigners who are having babies her, and we’ve had a domestic decline in birthrates, then that’s covering it up. That’s the reason for my question. How do you categorise people?
Dr Gruen: We look at the resident population and we also record births. But I don’t understand the implication of whether people are vaccinated or not, because the same statements would be true of people who grew up here and chose not to be vaccinated.
Senator ROBERTS: Correct, but we don’t know because we don’t really have an assessment of the population now because of the inference—
Dr Gruen: I think I do. We have just as good an assessment as we ever did, I think.
Senator Gallagher: Births would be captured through state hospital systems that wouldn’t discriminate on visa status.
Senator ROBERTS: Correct. That’s my point. Do you know what I’m getting it?
Senator Gallagher: Okay.
Dr Gruen: All the people who usually live in Australia, regardless of visa status, are included in the statistics.
Senator ROBERTS: Do you trap any data by COVID vaccination status—births, deaths, illness, employment—anything at all?
Dr Gruen: The Australian Immunisation Register records vaccination status for people who are vaccinated, and that data is linked in our integrated data asset, which goes by the name of Person Level Integrated Data Asset. Researchers have done an analysis using the link between the Australian Immunisation Register and other datasets to examine all sorts of questions of relevance. The department of health used that link to find out which language groups in the community had low-vaccination uptake during COVID, and there have been researchers at the University of New South Wales that have looked at mortality by vaccination status. That was a paper published in the Lancet. So the data exists, and it is available to researchers who are doing research that is assessed to be in the public interest, but it’s individual data that has been de-identified and is kept in a secure environment to be worked on. It’s not data that gets published on our website.
Senator ROBERTS: No. Given the minister said there are no vaccine mandates at the moment—
Dr Gruen: I think she said there were no Commonwealth government vaccine mandates.
Senator ROBERTS: Correct. That’s true. I’m taking it from what you’re saying then that you don’t trap data by COVID vaccination status, births, deaths, illness, employment or anything else like that.
Dr Gruen: The answer would be that you could uncover that by linking the Australian Immunisation Register to other datasets that capture that information. But, for instance, in our labour force survey we don’t ask about vaccination status.
Senator ROBERTS: Your data on COVID deaths shows deaths by ethnicity, and people were saying that that was very handy to have and it’s significant, with some nationalities having three times the death rate from COVID as the Australian average, as you pointed out.
Dr Gruen: Yes.
Senator ROBERTS: I hope our health officials are now trying to work out why they’re different outcomes— and some of them are. I notice, however, that you are removing ethnicity from the 2026 census. How is that helping—
Dr Gruen: We’re not removing ethnicity from the 2026 Census. We never collected ethnicity in any of the censuses, so it’s not a removal.
Senator ROBERTS: Okay, my mistake.
Dr Gruen: That’s okay.
Senator ROBERTS: Moving on to inflation—
CHAIR: Last question, Senator Roberts.
Senator ROBERTS: That’ll be one of a series. I’m just flagging that I’ll come back to this topic when we come back again. Moving on to inflation, your official interest rate does not agree with the perception everyday Australians have—
Senator Gallagher: That’s not—
Dr Gruen: Hang on. The official interest rate is the Reserve Bank; we publish the CPI.
Senator ROBERTS: Thank you. That’s a correction. Your CPI—
Dr Gruen: The Consumer Price Index.
Senator ROBERTS: Your CPI does not agree with the perception everyday Australians have of how much things are going up. Let’s unpack that: the measure you use for inflation is a basket of goods—
Dr Gruen: Yes, and services.
Senator ROBERTS: thank you—which changes more frequently than people might realise.
Dr Gruen: The basket?
Senator ROBERTS: Yes, the components in the basket. What’s in the shopping basket?
Dr Gruen: The basket is enormous. For instance, we capture every item—in a de-identified way—that is sold in the four major supermarkets. It’s a very extensive measure.
Senator ROBERTS: In the last change of weighting, the category of recreation and culture increased by 16 per cent. That category happened to be one of the leading disinflationary categories dragging down the CPI figure. Are you telling Australians that in the middle of the worst cost-of-living crisis in decades they are spending 16 per cent more on recreation and culture than a year ago?
Dr Gruen: I don’t have the weights for the CPI in front of me, but I’m happy to take that on notice. Do you mean 16 percentage points or 16 per cent?
Senator ROBERTS: The weighting of the category of recreation and culture increased by 16 per cent.
Dr Gruen: We can check that. I can tell you that we update the weights every year so that they are an accurate reflection of expenditure by average households in the capital cities. That’s the point of the exercise. Most of the time, those weights change gradually, but I don’t have in my head the particular weight that you are talking about.
Senator ROBERTS: I’ll return to that topic in the next one.
Thank you – checks and balances are so necessary and you are providing that
are they really that stupid malcolm? reading the transcript is like a comedy sitcom, BUT it’s quite scary how ignorant and stupid this government is 😡😡 can’t boot them out quick enough, although it’s a bit late, the damage is done 😡 now the next government will try to put things right, but will get blamed for the ways and means of how they do it… regards jean moore
Thankyou Malcom! You are the light we all need.
Great questions for the public interest Malcolm. Thank your for your line of inquiry here.
Maybe I’m just getting old and jaded but I am beginning to think the the BS in ABS does not stand for Bureau of Statistics.
Senator Roberts I admire your patience.
Malcolm,
The ignorance and rank stupidity demonstrated by some people is beyond comprehension , I am talking about politicians such as Kate Gallagher. The statements she made to you abput mandatory covid jabs was mind boggling. The terrible thing is just perhaps she knew the shots were mandatory and doesn’t care about fellow human beings, what a monster.
It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see the cost of living has jumped 30-40% in the last 5 years. The end of week bill on the basics tells the truth, not some basket of goods most people would never buy in a period of inflation.