Australia’s bipartisan approach to migration and refugee settlement was on show at this month’s Settlement Council of Australia (SCOA) triennial conference with representatives from both major parties extolling the virtues of diversity and multiculturalism.

Turnbull Government minister for multicultural affairs, Craig Laundy told the conference that 12,000 Syrian refugees had been identified by the Department of Immigration and Border Protection for resettlement in Australia.

He said that delays in the commitment to settle the extra 12,000 Syrian refugees were partly because of the need to take into account issues around national security.

“We are accepting these refugees from camps on the borders of Syria and Iraq. The documentation related to these people is difficult and we are going through a structured and organised program.

“It was always going to take time to setup the identification. Now we are doing things like biometrics and fingerprints. But as of April 29, we have 12,000 people that the department of immigration has interviewed and they have met the threshold of the visa requirements.

He said 4,600 people had now been granted visas and more than 7,800 were awaiting the outcomes of health character and or security checks.

Mr Laundy told the conference that even though Australia had world’s best practice in resettlement there was always room to improve.

“The key thing that I like about this conference is that you have guests from right around the world and although we are renowned as world’s best practice that’s not to say we can’t ever learn ways to improve – taking things that other people are doing,” Mr Laundy said.

He said it would be a focus on the federal government to improve employment outcomes over the first five years of the settlement experience for new arrivals to Australia.

“That’s very much where my focus will be,” he said.

Opposition immigration spokesman, Richard Marles said the decision to accept extra refugees was a good example of bipartisanship.

“It was a wonderful moment last year when you saw both government and opposition, Labour and Liberal, ultimately working together, and in some respects competing with each other, about how generous we can be,” he said.

“The ultimate outcome of that, a commitment to bringing 12,000 people from the Syrian conflict, is just a really good contribution, a wonderful contribution to global humanitarian affairs,” Mr Marles said.

“We are talking though, about people fleeing persecution and danger, there is an urgency about it for them. So we owe it to them, in a sense the legacy of that wonderful decision in that magical week last year to make sure we do this in a timely way and we are concerned about the slow progress here,” he said.

Mr Marles said everyone had a role in welcoming new arrivals to Australia and making sure the nation’s migration and diversity policies continued to work.

“I think the starting point here is attitudinal, it is really important that we continue as a country to have an outward looking, open minded, modern view of the modern world and our place within it,” he said.

“To embrace multiculturalism; to see that people coming to Australia and bringing with them cultural characteristics but actually celebrating them as a part of Australia, is a part of what it is to be Australian and it completely enriches our experiences as Australians and our national culture.

“Embracing that I think is perhaps the most important thing that we can do and in the same breath, obviously people need to confront prejudice wherever they find it.

“It’s not good enough that one in five migrants is experiencing some form of discrimination. So I think in the way, that we live our lives and engage with migrants and celebrate diversity – that’s perhaps the most important thing,” Mr Marles said.

Ruby Brown
AMES Australia Staff Writer