Jerome Laxale (Bennelong, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I'm proud to represent one of the most diverse communities in Australia. I acknowledge the member for Fowler, who probably represents a community that's a little bit more diverse than mine. But, I can tell you what, I'm very proud to represent a very diverse community in Bennelong. Sixty-six per cent of those who live in Bennelong have one or both parents born overseas. Over 50 per cent of my community speak a language other than English at home. That diversity makes our community stronger, and migration and immigration into this country makes our community stronger. Each and every month, I have the pleasure of going to a citizenship ceremony at one of the three local councils in my area. It's something I've been doing for nearly a decade now in my role as a councillor and mayor, and it's one of my favourite things to do is an elected official. I share that special day with locals who have been in the community for a little while, having come from overseas and having made that really hard decision to leave their homeland and move to Australia, just like my parents did back in the sixties and eighties. They make that really hard decision to uproot their families and move to Australia because it's a land of promise and hope. To celebrate that day with them is something that I really relish.

I'm so glad that this government has fixed up the mess that was left behind by the former government in immigration processing and visa times. Citizenship is exactly an area in which this government has made many, many inroads. In the last 12 months alone the backlog of citizenship applications has been reduced by 30 per cent, with the number of applications now sitting at below 93,000 the first time in six years. That is quite an achievement. In the past 12 months alone, over 173,000 people have received Australian citizenship through conferral. That's an 18 per cent increase on the year before. Average processing times have also undergone a substantial reduction of 40 per cent, with more than 90 per cent of applicants only waiting six months to attend a ceremony.

I have witnessed this feedback firsthand. I remember not that long ago, particularly when we had to do citizenship ceremonies during the pandemic, we had to do some of these processes online. I remember asking people: 'How long has the process been? Has it been difficult?' They would say: 'We've been waiting two, three years for our citizenship. It's been a difficult process.' I had feedback at the citizenship ceremony in Ryde only a few weeks ago that someone had their application processed and became an Australian citizen within six months. That is something that is a direct consequence of a Labor government, because we value immigration, we value citizenship and we value a pathway to permanent residency and citizenship, which those opposite just did not.

When we came to government, over one million visas were left unprocessed. We had a previous government that told people to go home, to leave this country, rather than helping them to stay here. They said, 'Leave,' and they had no plan for reopening the borders. We had to employ 684 new staff to support the visa system to get through this backlog, because we on this side of the House understand the importance of migration to our social fabric and the importance of migration to our economy. The Liberal legacy was dire. They undermined Australia's visa system. They prioritised temporary immigration over permanent residency and citizenship, and they told people to go home during the pandemic and had no plan for when the border opened.

In the last few months, we've seen these attacks on immigrants and on migrants go even further. We've had questions in question time and MPIs blaming new citizens and migrants and those who choose to make Australia home for the failures of the past 10 years of their government. They're blaming migration for traffic jams in Sydney. They're blaming migration for the housing crisis that they left us with. Shame on them for doing that. We on this side of the House will never do that, because we know that a secure, transparent and efficient migration system makes this country strong. It is what our country was built on. It's what our economy was built on. I am very proud to be here as a son of parents who made that decision to move from overseas and come to Australia. They were welcomed with open arms, and never should that change. Never should migrants be blamed for 10 years of inaction on infrastructure delivery from the former government. We are tackling some of these issues that they raise, but we will not be blaming migration for them. I ask the minister to update the House on what improvements have been made to the visa processing system since forming government.

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