Kerry Nettle (NSW, Australian Greens) Share this | Hansard source

The point that I have been making is that the government sent out a message about excluding people from being able to be citizens. There are people with racist exclusionary views within our society who have responded to that call. They have seen this as an opportunity that the government has created for them to put forward and to gain support for their racist views. That is what we saw in their submission and that is why I have chosen to highlight that particular submission.

The Greens see this citizenship test as a step back from the support for multiculturalism that we think the government of Australia should be promoting. We have seen the government stepping back from multiculturalism. We have seen it even with the way that ‘multicultural affairs’ was dropped from the title of the department. We do not have the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs anymore, and the opposition followed suit by dropping ‘multicultural affairs’ from their senior immigration portfolio as well, replacing it with ‘integration’.

Instead, the Greens would like to see our government talking about the great value of multiculturalism in our society. We would like to see the government encouraging migrants to learn English. We agree that English language skills help you to survive in Australian society. Therefore, I will be moving a second reading amendment on behalf of the Greens that calls on the government to increase funding to and expand upon existing English language programs. In that way we will be able to encourage migrants to learn English language skills.

The Senate committee heard evidence from Ms Katie Wrigley from the Refugee Advice and Casework Services in Sydney. She talked about the limitations on the existing English language hours of study available to new migrants. She was talking about how limited that is and how it would not allow people the English language skills that they might need to pass the proposed citizenship test. She said:

The contents of the proposed test, including questions about Australian values, would be outside the vocabulary scope of basic language classes for those learning a new language with the first 510 hours of study.

And that is all that is currently provided in the existing English language programs for migrants.

If the government were really interested in improving the English language skills of migrants, it would expand these existing programs and ensure that migrants were able to get the English language skills they need. It can take a really long time to learn a language. There are people for whom English is their first language, and it still takes them an extraordinarily long time—many years—to grasp the language. If you are coming to Australia as, say, a young African refugee, you have never learnt your own language in a formal setting, let alone attempt to learn another language in a formal setting. So you would arrive in Australia without any English, without any history of having formal training in any written language, and you would be expected within 510 hours of study to be able to gain enough English to pass this kind of citizenship test. It is just not going to happen.

We have heard about the number of migrants who are not able to attend even the limited 510 hours of study that are available because they have to work, because they have to get money to survive in their new country or because they have small children and family and child-rearing responsibilities. If the government were genuine about wanting to ensure that all those people had the opportunity to learn English, they would ensure that child care was available so that migrant mothers would be able to go and learn the English language skills that are so important for them in being able to engage in Australian society.

There was another issue that was raised in the course of the Senate inquiry into this matter, and that was about the level of discretion that is given to the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship in this legislation whereby the minister is able to determine what shall be in the citizenship test. This is about deciding who can or cannot become a citizen. Surely we, the parliament, should have some say in what kind of test, if there is to be a test, is put in place to determine who should be able to become a citizen.

The Greens believe that parliamentary oversight of any citizenship test, if it is to be introduced, is important, and so I will be moving in the committee stage of this legislation an amendment to ensure that, where the government makes a determination about what questions are to be in a citizenship test, the parliament has some oversight into this. This was an issue raised by many of the organisations that appeared before the Senate committee.

As I said at the outset, I want to see us here in Australia celebrating the diversity of people that exist in Australia and their contribution to Australia. I note that the member for Kooyong, Petro Georgiou, spoke in the House of Representatives about his own father as an example of somebody who has made a massive contribution to Australian life, and of course we all know there are many such people who would not be able to pass the citizenship test that has been proposed. I have spoken with many members of the Greek community in my suburb in Sydney who are extraordinarily concerned about it and who would not pass the citizenship test. Most of them have been in Australia, working and contributing to the Australian community, for between 20 and 30 years—as have people at the Cyprus Club, which is just around the corner from my place. They have all been contributing, yet they would not pass the citizenship test that has been proposed.

I want to live in a country which is made up of migrants who contribute to our society. This citizenship test is not going to increase the number of migrants that can come to Australia and contribute to Australian society. I want to see the government speaking out about multiculturalism and the benefits that it brings to our society. We have seen governments in the past in Australia, right from the White Australia policy at the beginning, that have sought to limit the diversity of people in Australian society. But we have also seen, from the beginning up until now, fair-minded people in society speak up and stand up for the importance of diversity within our community and for the value that multiculturalism brings to our society. We have seen over the whole history of this country that people have spoken out about the value of multiculturalism. Now is an occasion when we as members of parliament can join with those in the community who speak out about the value of our multicultural society and who seek to prevent steps being taken that will limit that diversity within our society. This is an opportunity to stand up and take that position of supporting the diversity of people that make up our society. That is what the Greens will be doing, and we call on other senators to do likewise.

It is really disappointing that the opposition, as we heard from the previous speaker, have decided to support this legislation. I think more foresight is needed to understand the history of how governments have sought in the past to limit immigration, to be exclusionary in terms of who is able to gain citizenship, to the detriment of our society, by preventing people from various backgrounds becoming citizens. I want to see us stand up against that. It is important that other senators join the Greens in standing up to promote and to celebrate the diversity of our society and the multiculturalism that has made us a strong and safe country. I move the second reading amendment standing in my name:

At the end of the motion, add:

                 “and the Senate is of the view that the Government should:

             (a)    increase the hourly funding rate for the Adult Migrant English Programme (AMEP); and

             (b)    increase the funding to expand the Adult Migrant English Programme (AMEP)”.