DIMA Annual Report 1997-98
Sub-program 4.3: Settlement and Language Services
Objective
Description
Performance information
Financial and staffing resources summary
Performance outcomes
Objective
To arrange settlement programs for recently arrived migrants and humanitarian entrants, which complement the services governments direct to all Australian residents.
Description
This sub-program provides resources for a range of settlement services which assist migrants' early settlement and equitable participation in Australian society.
Eligibility for services varies with conditions of entry.
The sub-program operates under the policy framework of the National Integrated Settlement Strategy (NISS), which aims to coordinate and improve the provision of settlement services to migrants through coordination and cooperative action between agencies at all levels of government and in the community.
At the national level, bilateral and multilateral consultations occur with other Government agencies on policy initiatives impinging on migrants, while at the State/Territory level, key partnerships are forged with community-based organisations and State/Territory and Local Government agencies through Settlement Planning Committees.
The sub-program is delivered through the provision of English language tuition, through the Adult Migrant English Program (AMEP); on-site and telephone interpreting and translating, through the Translating and Interpreting Service (TIS); and financial grants to community organisations, some of which deliver ethno-specific services to migrants.
Responsibility for program management is shared between Settlement Branch and Citizenship and Language Services Branch. Responsibility for service delivery lies with the Department's State and Territory offices.
[ Top Of Page ]Performance information
Outcomes are measured by the extent to which:
- Service agreements, emphasising accountability for service delivery outcomes as specified in agreed work programs, were introduced for funded organisations in the 1997–98 grants round and reporting arrangements were refined;
- Adult Migrant English Program (AMEP) objectives were achieved;
- the review of the Translating and Interpreting Service (TIS) explored options for enhanced service delivery;
- existing planning and consultation frameworks under the NISS were further enhanced;
- the Refugee Resettlement Advisory Council (RRAC) provided community input to Commonwealth Ministers on refugee settlement issues;
- a settlement policy framework was articulated which reflected new Government policy directions;
- strategies were developed to encourage potential sponsors, where appropriate, to address the settlement needs of migrants more effectively; and
- an improved settlement information strategy was developed for migrants, both on and offshore.
Financial and staffing resources summary
1997–98 |
1997–98 |
1996–97 |
|
| Budgetary (cash) basis | |||
| Components of appropriations | |||
| Annual appropriations | |||
| Running costs | 24 915 |
26 637 |
n/a |
| Other program costs | 139 388 |
138 802 |
n/a |
| Total appropriations | 164 303 |
165 439 |
n/a |
| Less adjustments | 6 760 |
6 667 |
n/a |
| Total outlays | 157 543 |
158 772 |
n/a |
| Total revenue | 8 704 |
10 469 |
n/a |
| Staffing | |||
| Staff years (actual) | 264 |
281 |
n/a |
Due to program restructures in both 1996–97 and 1997–98, sub-program figures for 1996–97 actuals are not meaningful for comparative purposes to 1997–98 figures. They have therefore not been included in this table.
[ Top Of Page ]Performance outcomes
(i) Service Agreements
Consistent with Government-wide commitments to greater effectiveness and accountability, the Department introduced Service Agreements for organisations funded under the Community Settlement Services (CSS) Scheme (formerly the Grant-in-Aid and Migrant Access Projects Scheme) for 1997–98.
Agreements were signed with all of the organisations which received worker-based and major project awards in the 1997–98 CSS Scheme round.
Work Programs attached to the Agreements required funded organisations to be more accountable for the services they have agreed to provide.
A similar approach was taken towards the Migrant Resource Centre (MRC) network. A review was conducted which included the circulation of a discussion paper and consultations undertaken with all DIMA-funded MRCs around Australia.
The Department substantially revised the existing MRC Service Agreements to more clearly define the responsibilities of the Department and the MRCs, and require greater accountability of MRCs for their core funding, through the development of clearly defined work programs.
In 1997–98, the Department funded 32 MRCs and awarded 332 worker-based grants and 99 project-based grants from 1 087 applications.
Revised reporting guidelines for organisations funded under the CSS Scheme were introduced, following a review of reporting arrangements, to ensure greater relevance and consistency of data collected for monitoring and planning client services.
Changes to the reporting guidelines included clearer definitions of data categories and the capacity to report on services to first time clients, humanitarian entrants and domestic violence-related inquiries. The number of MRCs reporting on client services in the nationally consistent format was extended.
Further improvements to the reporting arrangements of MRCs have been developed, based on CSS scheme reporting guidelines, to take effect with new Service Agreements, in July 1998.
The Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) initiated a preliminary study, in February 1998, of the CSS scheme, the MRC Program and the On-Arrival Accommodation program.
On the basis of this preliminary study, in June 1998 the ANAO initiated a full performance audit of the provision of migrant settlement services by the Department.
The audit is addressing strategic management, including the corporate planning, performance measurement and reporting arrangements in place, and management of the individual schemes operated by the Department.
(ii) Adult Migrant English Program (AMEP)
Reach, participation rates and outcomes
The Adult Migrant English Program (AMEP) gives migrants access to English language education soon after arrival in Australia.
Clients receive tuition in a competency-based curriculum which helps them to develop the language and literacy skills they need to enable them to participate in the community, seek and maintain employment and undertake further education and training as required.
To minimise barriers to access, the AMEP provides child care support for eligible clients who have been unable to make their own arrangements for child care, and would not otherwise be able to attend English as a Second Language (ESL) classes.
Approximately 4 233 children were provided with care in AMEP-specific child care centres and through mainstream child care services compared with 3 881 children in 1996.
Around 67.9 per cent of adult migrant arrivals, who were perceived to be in need of English tuition, registered with the AMEP by the end of the first term of 1998, compared with 72.2 per cent for the same period in 1997. For each of the key migration categories the registration rate was:
- refugee and humanitarian – 87.3 per cent (87.8 per cent in 1996 and 89 per cent in 1995);
- family *– 57.2 per cent (64.1 and 65.9 per cent respectively);
- skill – 73.3 per cent (73.3 and 75.2 per cent, respectively); and
- other – 61.5 per cent.
* From 1 July 1997, concessional family has been grouped under the skill stream (for the first six months of 1997, the registration for Concessional Family was 83.2 per cent, compared with 85.3 per cent in 1996 and 76.8 per cent in 1995).
AMEP client numbers fell from 40 366 in 1996 to 39 129 in 1997, reflecting changes in the size and the composition of the migration program.
Under the Certificate in Spoken and Written English (CSWE) curriculum framework, out of 17 815 clients (compared within 16 523 in 1996 and against a forecast of 15 600) exiting the AMEP in 1997:
- 57.8 per cent entered at CSWE Level One (compared to 55 per cent in 1996), and (on average) achieved 15 competencies (12 competencies in 1996);
- 26.6 per cent (28 per cent in 1996) entered at CSWE Level Two, and (on average) achieved 16 competencies (13 competencies in 1996); and
- 15.6 per cent (17 per cent in 1996) entered at CSWE Level Three, and (on average) achieved 10 competencies (10 competencies in 1996).
Certificates/Statements of Competencies were awarded to AMEP clients as follows:
- Certificate/Statement of Competency Level One – 32.6 per cent (compared to 23 per cent in 1996);
- Certificate/Statement of Competency Level Two – 26 per cent (21 per cent in 1996);
- Certificate/Statement of Competency Level Three – 23.7 per cent (19 per cent in 1996); and
- Record of Achievement – 17.7 per cent (37 per cent in 1996).
Note: Direct comparison between 1996 and 1997 CSWE competencies is not possible as competency data was not recorded for all AMEP clients in 1996.
[ Top Of Page ]ESL initiatives
An additional $17.7 million for English language training, over a period of four years started in 1997–98, has improved the flexibility of the program, through expanding service arrangements to meet identified client needs.
Most of the funding has been directed towards meeting the special needs of refugee and humanitarian entrants.
Clients in this category, who are assessed as not ready for mainstream AMEP tuition because of their experiences of torture and trauma, are offered up to 100 hours of English tuition in Special Preparatory Programs, prior to entering mainstream classes.
Approximately 2 000 clients participated in Special Preparatory Programs in 1997–98.
A further initiative being implemented under the additional funding is an enhancement of the Home Tutor Scheme, which provides volunteer English language assistance to clients either individually in their homes or in small groups.
The additional funding is enabling the Home Tutor Scheme to expand its role to support community agencies offering English language assistance to people not eligible for the AMEP.
Support includes the training of tutors and assistance with curriculum advice and teaching materials.
AMEP competitive tendering
During 1997, the Government introduced new arrangements for the delivery of the AMEP through competitive tendering on the open training market.
The tendering process was undertaken to implement the Government's commitment to making the AMEP more flexible, cost effective, appropriate and accountable.
The process started in Victoria and Western Australia, with contracts for service delivery in January 1998, followed by all other States and Territories in July 1998.
The result has been to contract a diverse range of experienced, high quality providers of English tuition under the AMEP across Australia, including Technical and Further Education (TAFE) colleges, universities, private sector organisations and community agencies.
Contracts with service providers incorporate mechanisms to ensure a high quality of AMEP service delivery.
These accountability mechanisms include monitoring of contract requirements by an external agency, measurement of client learning outcomes against benchmarks, and annual reporting against agreed performance measures.
AMEP 50th anniversary
1998 marks the 50th anniversary of the Adult Migrant English Program. The Department implemented a program of activities to celebrate AMEP's half-century of service to the community as a migrant language and settlement program.
The anniversary year began, in May 1998, with a national launch in Melbourne. This was followed by a celebration at Canberra's old Parliament House, in June 1998, highlighting the role of the Commonwealth in creating the AMEP.
A photographic display, showing the AMEP's 50 years of history, was a focal point of these events, and the display was presented at a series of launches held in the States and Territories.
A website was developed to promote 50th anniversary activities, disseminate information to the media and provide general information on the AMEP to a broad audience.
The AMEP 50th anniversary year will culminate with a major international conference, The AMEP: 50 Years of Nation Building, in Melbourne in February 1999 to showcase the AMEP's unique role in adult English education, its contribution to migrant settlement and to maximise Australia's cultural diversity.
Herman Duarte, formerly from South America, entertains guests at AMEP's 50th anniversary celebrations in Hobart.
[ Top Of Page ](iii) Translating and Interpreting Service (TIS)
TIS helps migrants with limited English skills to access services provided by Government and community agencies. The service offers varied employment opportunities for more than 2 000 independent contractors across more than 100 community languages.
TIS provides an around-the-clock telephone interpreting service on its national telephone number –131 450. Face-to-face onsite interpreting and document translation services are available during local business hours.
To meet community service obligations, the Department provides translations of crucial documents, free of charge, to new arrivals, in their first two years of settlement.
The Department also bears the cost of free TIS interpreting services provided to community based nonprofit organisations and for medical consultations covered by Medicare. Access to free on-site interpreting is limited by resource quotas.
Highest demand languages in 1997–98 included Serbian, Arabic, Vietnamese, Spanish, Mandarin, Croatian, Cantonese, Russian and Bosnian.
The languages in greatest demand have been the same for the last three years, however the order has varied slightly.
TIS continues to focus upon four goals: maintaining strategic directions and priorities in accordance with Government policy; reducing costs; increasing revenue; and improving client service delivery.
[ Top Of Page ]Table 4.3 (a): TIS services delivered in 1997–98
| Service | Community |
Commercial |
| Telephone interpreting calls | 58 000 |
101 000 |
| On-site interpreting assignments | 22 000 |
53 000 |
| Translation tasks (6.5 million words) | 25 000 |
20 000 |
Of the various TIS activities, only commercial translations sustained a slight improvement over 1996–97 figures.
The decline in TIS activity may be attributed to a variety of factors, including the provision of interpreting services by Centrelink, the Commonwealth's service delivery agency.
A review of TIS operations was conducted during 1997 and identified the need for streamlining of the administration of a national service.
Administrative functions of five TIS offices (Adelaide, Brisbane, Canberra, Darwin and Hobart) were consolidated in existing offices at Perth, Melbourne and Sydney.
The Perth Office now provides services for Northern Territory and Western Australian clients; Melbourne serves South Australia, Tasmania and Victoria; and Sydney serves the ACT, NSW and Queensland.
During 1997–98, significant enhancements were also made to the TIS Information System (TISIS) resulting in more sophisticated contractor management and job allocation functions as well as Year 2000 compliance.
[ Top Of Page ](iv) Settlement planning
The National Integrated Settlement Strategy (NISS) is the settlement policy and planning framework for the delivery and coordination of settlement services at all levels of Government and in the community.
At its March 1998 meeting, the Ministerial Council of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs reaffirmed the following national settlement priorities:
- English language training;
- access to the labour market;
- settlement information;
- access to housing;
- translating and interpreting services;
- support from sponsors;
- a more integrated approach to the settlement needs of refugee and humanitarian program entrants; and
- meeting the settlement-related needs of the ethnic aged.
Significant achievements by State and Territory settlement planning committees in 1997–98 include:
- the launch of new or updated settlement plans in Queensland, Western Australia, Tasmania, ACT, the Riverina and Albury-Wodonga;
- evaluations of the Victorian and Northern Territory settlement plans;
- achievement of outcomes, by individual member agencies and collectively, against undertakings in current settlement plans (in relation to the national priority areas mentioned above and in response to priority issues at the State/Territory and local level); and
- publication and dissemination of State/Territory specific settlement information kits.
The committees have also focused on ways of improving planning processes. For example:
- in Victoria, the Department and the Victorian Multicultural Affairs Unit are cooperating to produce a series of 25 migrant community profiles, to improve the settlement planning data available to service providers; and
- in South Australia, a significant settlement planning seminar, involving more than 130 community workers, contributed towards the development of the South Australian settlement plan.
Planning is being enhanced through the establishment of processes to facilitate linkages with MRCs. As a result, systemic issues identified in MRCs' work with individual clients may be addressed by the committees.
Most committees have created task groups aimed at achieving specific outcomes in priority areas.
(v) Refugee Resettlement Advisory Council
The Refugee Resettlement Advisory Council (RRAC) met four times in 1997–98. The Council's Chair is Major-General Warren Glenny AO RFD ED (Rtd). Other members are Dr Mohammed Taha Alsalami, Mr Paris Aristotle, Mrs Ellen Goodman, Ms Carmel Guerra, Mr Kevin Liston, Ms Kathryn Nguyen, Ms Margaret Piper and Mr Gerald Searle.
The Chair recently issued a report on RRAC's role and achievements over the last twelve months.
He noted that the Council had been able to provide the Department with valuable advice on the settlement experiences of refugee and humanitarian entrants and on the ways in which different services assist the settlement process.
The Council advised the Minister in relation to the decision to extend the duration of existing worker-based community grants by twelve months, and award grants in the next round for 12, 24 or 36 months, depending on need.
This resulted in providing community organisations with more scope for longer term planning and service provision. Community feedback to Council members indicated that these changes were well received.
RRAC has also advised the Minister on issues affecting the settlement of refugee youth and adolescents.
As a result, the Council is working with the Department to ensure that this client group is appropriately catered for by services provided under the Integrated Humanitarian Settlement Strategy (IHSS).
The Council is currently considering significant issues relating to the development of the IHSS, in particular the:
- importance of the rationale for and delivery of early intervention services for arriving refugees and humanitarian entrants, and how such services might be developed;
- role of proposers in the settlement process; and
- way in which Community Refugee Settlement Scheme volunteers might link into the new case management service.
(vi) Settlement policy
An information paper on NISS national priorities and a paper on settlement policy and services produced for the Minister's annual community consultations began the process of articulating a new settlement policy framework.
Comment has been provided in relation to a wide range of other processes, including the Points Test Review and a Senate Inquiry into the impact of the two year waiting period for social security payments for newly arrived migrants, which addressed settlement policy issues arising from new Government directions.
Significant attention has been given to issues relating to the assessment of intending migrants' settlement prospects, and to processes for better identifying settlement need.
In addition, the Department provided evidence to the British House of Commons Select Committee on Health's inquiry into the welfare of British child migrants who were sent to former British colonies, including Australia, from the 1920s until around 1967.
(vii) Sponsors' role in settlement
A survey of sponsors and proposers was conducted to improve understanding of their role in the settlement process, as part of a broader examination of sponsorship and proposal arrangements.
The survey found that most respondents needed information to better understand the importance of their role in the settlement process and to assist the people they were sponsoring or proposing to settle in Australia.
Sponsors saw the Department and agencies funded by the Department as a significant source of information.
These and related issues will be progressed in 1998–99 through the development of settlement information products, including sponsorship forms, and the Department's Internet site.
(viii) Settlement information
Developments in settlement information focused particularly on offshore information for intending migrants.
New settlement information forms, and other advice, have been developed to provide information on the two year waiting period for social security payments; employment prospects; and the cost of living in Australia.
In addition, a process has been established for providing information to Centrelink on Special Benefit Review cases, to ensure that Centrelink is aware of DIMA's information provision role to applicants overseas.
A review of DIMA's settlement information role concluded that a more coordinated approach to dissemination of settlement information is needed as well as greater clarity concerning the roles and responsibilities of information provision within various areas of the Department.
In 1998–99, the Department will respond to the review's findings through the development of a Community Information Network. Building on the Department's Internet site, this project will:
- provide clearer information and better links to other agencies' Internet sites, targeting intending and newly arrived migrants, as well as the community agencies which provide services to new arrivals in Australia;
- enable electronic communication and reporting with and from Migrant Resource Centres and other agencies funded by DIMA; and
- facilitate the distribution of settlement planning data produced by DIMA and used by a range of Government and community agencies in planning the delivery of settlement services.