National Agenda for a Multicultural Australia
Issues
The cultural diversity of Australia is not reflected in the key decision-making institutions of society. This is particularly true of our formal political structures:
- The representation of women, Aboriginal people and people from non-English speaking backgrounds is poor at all levels of the Australian political system. Elected representation at the municipal, State and Federal levels of government does not mirror the ethnic composition of the total population.
At the State and Commonwealth levels, for example, only 7% of Parliamentarians are from non-English speaking backgrounds. Aboriginal people and women are similarly under-represented. Remedying this situation depends in part on broader issues affecting social and economic equality, as well as on proportionate participation in political party processes and on the preselection policies of the parties themselves.
FIGURE 2.1 Australian Parliaments Ethnic Composition Percentage of NESB Members*
Source: J Jupp: The Political Participation of Ethnic Minorities in Australia (1989)
| * | Members of Parliament from non-English speaking backgrounds (NESB) are defined as those who were born in non-English speaking countries and those who were born in Australia of parents born in non-English speaking countries. Queensland and South Australia also include members of non-English speaking origin, such as grandparents or more distant ancestry. |
- For the individual, however, citizenship, at least since 1984, is a precondition to the right to vote and the right to stand for Parliament. Most people born in Australia acquire this right automatically, but the overseas born who acquire permanent residency must separately apply for citizenship.
Figure 2.2 shows that immigrants from non-English speaking backgrounds are, in general, more likely to take up citizenship than other overseas-born Australians. Many British-born, for example, mistakenly believe they are Australian citizens because historically they enjoyed the same rights and privileges as the Australian-born.
- The Commonwealth has rejected coercion as a means of promoting citizenship. To deny non-citizens social security rights or benefits, for example, would devalue the symbolic commitment of citizenship by making it involuntary. The Government also recognizes the complex reasons that inhibit some permanent residents from taking up Australian citizenship (e.g. forfeiture of tangible rights, such as inheritance, in one's country of birth).
- The administrative arm of government, the public service, is also 10 unrepresentative of the community at large. This can mean that policy advice and program management are based on the unrepresentative personal experience and values of those who staff the public sector.
Most governments have introduced equal employment opportunity policies to ensure the selection of staff on genuine relative merit. For historical reasons, however, it will take time for such policies to broaden the composition of the senior management levels of the bureaucracy.
- Other important institutions in society are also unrepresentative of the general community. For example, while trade union membership is proportionately higher among workers from non-English speaking backgrounds, they are comparatively under-represented in the trade union leadership, as either honorary or full-time officials.
This is attributable to a range of factors such as attitudes, language proficiency, competing postsettlement priorities and length of residence. it means nonetheless that the interests of such groups (e.g. English language tuition as an integral part of retraining) are less likely to be fully comprehended and pursued in the industrial relations environment.
- The same pattern of unequal representation and participation expresses itself in other aspects of community life. For example, whereas more than half of Australians are members of a social club, sports club, or some other association, only one-third of those born in a non-English speaking country are likely to be so, and only one in four of those who arrived in Australia since 1981.
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