Alex Hawke (Mitchell, Liberal Party, Minister for Immigration, Citizenship, Migrant Services and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

I want to thank the member for Chisholm for her very important question about Australian multiculturalism. I want to remind the House, as the member reminds me regularly, that the member for Chisholm represents an electorate where over half the constituents speak a language other than English. I want to thank the member for Chisholm for her excellent advice to government over the course of the last year about the Australian Chinese community and the work they did at the beginning of the pandemic to help keep Australia safe.

As the member refers to, Australians can be rightly proud of the success story that is Australian multiculturalism. It is a very unique Australian brand of cultural integration. Our commitment to social cohesion has been shown right through this pandemic year, through the difficulties we've seen and faced. When you look at what has happened in the different communities all across this country and at the contribution they've made, I also want to say thank you to them on behalf of the government—groups like the Australian Arab Association, who distributed free surgical masks in Perth during the pandemic. The Australian Chinese Charity Foundation, which I attended with the member for Scullin on Sunday night, raised over $170,000 for bushfire relief and pandemic assistance. We've seen Sikhs making meals for people in distress and the Resourceful Australian Indian Network helping seniors through some very difficult times when the pandemic hit. Really Australians have pulled together as never before in different communities and different groups.

That's why, of course, the government remains committed to social cohesion as an important policy as we go through the course of the next year. We know the challenge is ongoing. We are going to see in the coming months a rollout of the vaccination campaign in people's languages, speaking to communities and making sure that people understand every part of the important safety and efficacy message of the vaccination campaign. It will be available in over 63 languages, of course. You'll be able to translate it off the department's websites. It will be on radio, print and social media and in messages in community. We're working with the SBS on over 60 languages which will have short explainer videos on the vaccination rollout, and the Migration Council of Australia, of course, is preparing resources in over 29 languages as well. Of course, I'm working regularly with the Minister for Health and Aged Care on how to make sure we get that very important message about the vaccination rollout to every single corner and community, such as the people in Chisholm. Of course, I'm looking forward to the roundtable tomorrow with faith leaders from across Australia, who will be discussing the vaccine rollout and what they can do to make sure communities participate.

I say to all colleagues: if you have culturally and linguistically diverse communities in your electorates, it's open to you to approach me or the department about how we can reach them and speak with them about the issues that they'll face and what we can do better in that regard. I look forward to those conversations. I again say thank you to the multicultural communities of Australia. We look forward to partnering with you. We are going to do the vaccination rollout together. (Time expired)

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