Skip to content

About the Department

The Refugee Resettlement Advisory Council (RRAC)

On this page


The Australian Government’s Refugee Resettlement Advisory Council(RRAC), established in 1997, was re-appointed for a fifth term on 19 March 2008.

About RRAC

RRAC, chaired by the Hon Bruce Baird, is an expert reference group on refugee and humanitarian settlement matters and consists of ten members who have wide ranging experience in working with refugees, or who arrived in Australia as refugees themselves.

RRAC advises the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship and the Parliamentary Secretary for Multicultural Affairs and Settlement Services on matters relating to the settlement of migrants and humanitarian entrants. In doing so, the council improves the information flow on settlement policy between the Government and the community sector.

In its fifth term, the key areas of focus for the council include:

  • improving the responsiveness of services across Government to the needs of migrants and humanitarian entrants
  • addressing the challenges faced by new arrivals to promote their social and economic participation
  • innovation, policy development and evaluation of specialised settlement services for humanitarian entrants.

The council's fifth term is from 19 March 2008 to 30 June 2010.

Further details are in the Terms of Reference, available in a PDF form.
See: Terms of Reference (26KB PDF file)

Membership

The following table lists the members of RRAC.

Name Background
Hon Bruce Baird, Chair
  • Chairman, Tourism and Transport Forum.
  • Member of Parliament, representing the electorate of Cook from 1998-2007.
  • Mr Baird was also a Member of the NSW Parliament.
Mr Paul Power
  • Chief Executive Officer, Refugee Council of Australia (RCOA) since May 2006.
  • Previously Manager of the Vincentian Social Action Centres in Campbelltown and Warrawong (NSW).
  • Mr Power has also worked in journalism and the international development sector.
Mr Daniel Zingifuaboro
  • Works with the DIAC-funded ACCES Services Inc in Logan, as the Executive Director.
  • Member of the Multicultural Communities Ministerial Committee, which advises the Queensland State Minister for Multicultural Affairs.
  • Member of the Queensland African Community Council.
  • Mr Zingifuaboro settled in Brisbane in 2001 as a humanitarian entrant from Sudan. He has formerly worked for Save the Children Fund (UK) Sudan and CARE International Kenya.
  • Former President of the Sudanese Community Association of Queensland.
Mr Mohamad Issa
  • Child Protection Case Worker working specifically with Muslim communities at the New South Wales Department of Community Services.
Ms Samia Baho
  • Program manager, Justice for Refugees, the Victorian Department of Justice.
  • Ms Baho is the founder and the former Executive Director of the Centre for African Australian Women's Issues, and the State-wide Adviser for the Family and Reproductive Rights Education Program.
Ms Jenny Semple
  • CEO of the South Eastern Region Migrant Resource Centre.
  • Ms Semple is also the Assistant Secretary of the Settlement Council of Australia, and a member of the Refugee Council of Australia Board of Management.
  • Ms Semple is also on a local TAFE board.
Mr Paris Aristotle AM
  • Director of the Victorian Foundation for Survivors of Torture and Trauma and part-time Commissioner for the Victorian Law Reform Commission.
  • Mr Aristotle has been a member of both the Immigration Detention Advisory Group and RRAC since their inceptions.
Mr Kevin Liston
  • Community Liaison Worker (Refugee Services), Department for Families and Communities, South Australia.
  • Former Director (executive) of the Australian Refugee Association.
  • Mr Liston has been a member of RRAC since inception.
Ms Margaret Piper
  • A consultant whose work currently centres on research, training and capacity building in the area of refugee settlement.
  • Ms Piper has worked in the refugee sector since 1986, and was the Executive Director of the Refugee Council of Australia (RCOA) for over 14 years until December 2005.
  • Ms Piper has been a member of RRAC since inception.
Ms Carmel Guerra
  • Founder and current CEO of the Centre for Multicultural Youth, a community-based organisation in Melbourne that advocates for the needs of young people from refugee and migrant backgrounds.
  • Ms Guerra has been a member of RRAC since inception.

 

Return to: Formal advisory structures