Simon Crean (Hotham, Australian Labor Party, Shadow Minister for Regional Development) Share this | Hansard source

I am delighted to follow my friend and colleague the member for Corio. He is a passionate supporter, as am I, of multiculturalism in this country, believing like all on our side that it has been the great strengthening cement for the growth and diversity that this country has experienced. The Australian Citizenship Bill 2005 replaces the 1948 Australian Citizenship Act. Whilst that act was the first to establish Australian citizenship, Australians retained their status as British subjects under that act. The reality is that, as a nation, we have grown significantly since the Second World War and we have had a massive contribution to that growth through immigration. With that, the concept of citizenship itself has had to evolve. Indeed, that original act has had 36 amendments to it, the most recent being in 2002. All of it has been developed in the spirit of bipartisanship, of not playing politics with the issues of immigration in this country. There was bipartisan recognition of the need to modernise the act to take account of the advances that had been made and the developments in the nation.

When Labor were in office we held an extensive inquiry under the chairmanship of another good friend, Senator Jim McKiernan. He and his committee made some very worthy recommendations—and they were shelved with the change of government in 1996. Now, 10 years on, this government finally has decided to do something, to pick up the task that we commenced over a decade ago. It has also drawn on the conclusions of the Australian Citizenship Council, but in all of that the government’s proposals were not tabled in the parliament until the 2005 bill, which we are debating. Why was that? It was not because the government had come to the view it needed to modernise—this was Labor’s position and it should have been a bipartisan position. The government came to that view because they felt they had to do something post the London bombings. This bill is not genuinely driven by a desire to modernise, to embrace or to update our experience as a nation with multiculturalism, to be proud of it, to promote it and to enhance it. It is not to build on the good qualities of tolerance and inclusiveness; the government wants to fire up, yet again, the urgency of the need to play on fear brought about through terrorist activities.

So here we have it, a government that wants to move on this issue and promote the values, if you can call them that, of fear and division rather than the values that we on this side of the House espouse of hope, opportunity, compassion and tolerance—the sorts of things that the member for Corio was talking about. It is these latter values that have to guide our approach to a comprehensive rewrite of this act. We on this side acknowledge the importance of doing other things if they are recommended to us, particularly in the wake of the London bombing. As important as that was in July of last year, I now ask the question: why are we not debating it until November the following year? Urgency, it seems, only matters when it is on the front page and fear is in people’s minds. Out of sight, it is also out of the government’s mind until some new spark, some new opportunity to drive the wedge, emerges again. I will come to that in a minute.

Also interesting to observe is that, post the London bombings, at the COAG meeting the premiers agreed to increase the time required to apply for citizenship from two to three years. This was picked up in the 2005 bill but not implemented until now. And now we have another amendment before us, without any consultation, to extend it by another year.

There is a lot in this bill with which we agree. Much of it we advocated, but there are key concerns. The government, as I said, is now amending the bill to increase the time required to apply for citizenship by another year. Labor vehemently opposes that extension. The original extension was based on consultation and agreement with the states and on intelligence briefings consequent on the London bombing. We accepted the process; we agreed on the outcome. No such consultations occurred in relation to the four-year requirement. We do not agree with it. Our second reading amendment opposes it. If the provision passes, Labor will reverse it on coming to power.

So why the change to four years? There has been no explanation by the government. It comes about because the newly appointed Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs, Andrew Robb, the member for Goldstein, conducted consultations and presented a discussion paper called ‘Australian citizenship: much more than a ceremony’. It went out in September this year. That discussion paper put out a number of proposals for consideration. One of them was the four-year extension—we acknowledge that. Another was the requirement for newly arrived migrants to pass a yet to be defined test, and another was the requirement to learn English.

These are controversial proposals, but of course they can be debated. We recognise the discussion paper putting them forward and we will engage in that debate because we have some very strong views. But why are we legislating for one of those proposals without the consultation that the government said would be accommodated by the release of the paper? It is unnecessary. It is provocative. That is the way this government acts. Labor, in office, will move to reverse this decision if the legislation passes.

Also presented in that discussion paper—it is not included here, but I want to make some comment about it—is the provocative requirement for people to speak English. There is nothing wrong with that in itself, provided resources are made available to do it. I make this point: I hope this is a provision that the government will not make retrospective because, if they do, there will be a lot of people who will not be able to remain in this country. The government would be sending a lot of people home today—people who have made real contributions to this nation.

Earlier the member for Kooyong spoke of his father’s experience as a person who never really mastered English, even though he thought he did, because he was too busy working hard to provide for his family and helping to build a new multicultural society. I am reminded that, when I first became the member for Hotham, the Nissan car plant in my electorate closed. That was a consequence of the Button car plan, when there was a massive rejigging of the industry away from total manufacture to component manufacture, and it saw the demise of one of the key manufacturers. At the time Labor had a program called the labour adjustment program that was designed for this restructuring. It was not there to pretend the restructuring would not happen but to recognise that people needed a hand up, that they needed help to make the transition.

The big problem at the Nissan plant was that we had 150 nationalities in the place. The trouble was a lot of them could not speak English. There was no point giving them the training programs because they could not speak the language or read the courses—and why? It was not because they had not made a contribution to the nation—many of them had worked in the plant in one form or another for decades. They had not been required to do so because all the company required of them was process working. We were maturing as an economy. Labor understood at the time the importance of committing resources, real resources, to help people make the transition, including the ability to speak the language.

English language training and people’s capacity to speak are important. It is just as important for the nation’s cohesion, for its growth, as it is for the individual’s opportunity. It is not enough to require proficiency in English; we must also provide the resources to enable people to learn the language. Labor understood that. It did much to provide assistance in settlement, in advocacy and in language training. But what do we have from the Howard government? It has cut back that assistance. On the one hand it is out there arguing that people should be required to learn the language and on the other, in the same year, it has cut another $10.8 million from the Adult Migrant English Program. What hypocrisy is that?

It is all very well to have the notion that people have to do things, but when they are not doing them and when they are not assisted to do them, they are not programs for inclusion—they are programs for exclusion. That is the point that this government has to come to grips with. It is not just English with which we have to help new arrivals; employment programs are another good case in point. The other day I received four DVDs from Minister Sharman Stone applauding achievements under the New Enterprise Incentive Scheme, a scheme which Labor introduced. It is one of the most successful labour market programs ever developed anywhere in the world—a program that has a success rate in excess of 90 per cent, a program that was given significant impetus by us under the Working Nation program, which was cut back by this government.

But, more than that, when I was the Minister for Employment, Education and Training, I understood the importance of tailoring aspects of that very successful program to meet the needs of migrant communities. Think about it: the types of migrants who came to this country had great entrepreneurial flair. What they did not have was the wherewithal, the ability and the resources to set themselves up in a business, to learn accounting procedures or many of the sorts of things that we take for granted. We tailored the NEIS program very specifically to recognise the support and assistance needed in migrant communities. It was a raging success and another initiative where Labor is prepared to not just talk about the need for people to get into business or learn the English language but also provide support mechanisms to help them do it.

The other important initiative was the support for the migrant resource centres—interestingly a program that a former member for Goldstein passionately supported. When Ian McPhee held that seat he continued the resourcing of the program. I should know as my father was appointed by him to chair the Prahran Migrant Resource Centre, a position he held for more than 20 years. Prahran is one of the most successful migrant resource centres in this country. That was an example of bipartisanship by an earlier member for Goldstein. I will be very interested to see, with the admonitions to new migrants that the new member for Goldstein would have them adhere to, whether he and the government are prepared to commit the same level of resources to help people take up the challenges that are being thrown out to them. Migrant resource centres are terribly important not just in their support for migrant communities but also for their advocacy and understanding—going out to bat for the special needs of newly-arrived migrants. They are an essential part of a settlement program, of an inclusion program, and of understanding the special needs, reaching out and committing the resources.

When I became the member for Hotham I made sure that we established such a body in the constituency—SEAAC, the Southern Ethnic Advisory and Advocacy Council. That still exists today and does a fantastic job in providing advocacy, assistance and support. More than that, though, it has been a magnet for the essential services in our community—the police, the fire, the ambulance—to work through these networks to respond to the particular needs of communities that are struggling, whether it is in terms of understanding or people going off the rails with drugs and crime. These are the sorts of things we have to commit resources to. We have seen significant examples of where that interface has been able to help and extend to developing young kids, particularly in sport. I am proud of that because I see it on the ground, but it will only happen if you resource these organisations. They have had their resources cut back because this government mouths the words of inclusion but does not practise the mechanisms for ensuring it.

I also make the point that I support the amendment in relation to the particular provision that has an impact on the Maltese in our community. There are some 300 in my electorate. I know the member for Gorton and the member for Prospect have larger proportions. Because of a quirk, there was a circumstance in which people who had to renounce their citizenship under section 18 at a particular time were, as a consequence of the way in which the law in Malta applied, deemed as having retained rights to Maltese citizenship, not having acquired them. I see that the government have made some moves in this direction. I hope that they are prepared to go the full extent. I think there have been some discussions going on. We have certainly proposed an amendment. I urge the government to get this right. There should be no group discriminated against. It is possible for this to be addressed.

I am convinced that immigration has unequivocally been good for this country—good for us economically, good for us socially, good for us culturally. It is a policy that enjoyed bipartisan support until Pauline Hanson—a circumstance that the Howard government condoned. Remember, I say this: of all the leaders of parties who have supported the bipartisanship, there is only one who did not, and he happens to be the Prime Minister today. He was the person who made the point that there were too many Asians in this country, and do you know what happened? The Liberal Party of that day took the Liberal leadership from him. That is what happened. Malcolm Fraser never would have done it. John Gorton would not have done it. You name any other Liberal leader—none of them played that card; only John Howard did. Australia has been a model of multiculturalism. We were able to hold our heads up proud as a nation of tolerance and inclusion. We all know the backlash that occurred with Hansonism and the government’s failed response in relation to it. Businesses were saying we were suffering because the things that we had been valued and respected for no longer existed.

But the Prime Minister does not just stop there. I almost drove the car into the one in front of me when I heard him a couple of Fridays ago reintroduce a word I have not heard for a long time—assimilation—and hold up the Greek community as one the great groups that had assimilated successfully into this country. This Prime Minister either does not get it or he is deliberately trying to impose his agenda. The Greeks that came here do not consider themselves as having assimilated—and I know they have not. I have many of them in my electorate. Certainly they have integrated, but they are proud of their culture, proud of their language, proud of their ancestry and proud of not only their ongoing contribution but their contribution to strengthening this nation. It is wrong, patronising and demeaning to say that they have become assimilated. They brought their language and their culture. They have adapted and they have been a significant contributor, like so many other groups in the community.

To draw people here, we have to go the extra yards to make sure that they are not only made to feel included but also helped to be included in our society. That is what this bill fails to do. We oppose the four-year extension but, more importantly, we will be looking at what the government intends to do in relation to the discussion paper. (Time expired)

See this speech in context