Australia must set-up new migrants and refugees to succeed

In addition to Labor's border protection failures, gross inefficiencies in the management of the migrant and refugee settlement program have placed unbearable pressure on settlement service providers throughout Australia.

A telling example of Labor's bureaucratic, one-size-fits-all approach can be seen in its delivery of English language services. In Australia, the primary vehicle for the delivery of these services to new migrants and refugees is the Adult Migrant English Program (AMEP).

Language skills are universally acknowledged throughout the world as being the crucial core component of positive settlement outcomes. As such, one would expect that Australia's settlement services programs for new migrants and refugees would be geared towards delivering outcomes that result in high levels of literacy.

So, how does Australia perform in this space?

In 2012/13, the AMEP will cost the Australian taxpayer more than $220 million – that's not a small number in anyone's language.

During Senate Estimates in February this year, under pressure from the Coalition, Labor was forced to admit that in 2010/11, 54 per cent of AMEP participants who were issued with certificates did not have functional English proficiency. A further 14 per cent of participants were issued with certificates of completion just for turning up. It is beyond me as to how anyone could consider a 68 per cent failure rate for a $220 million program even remotely acceptable. But, then again this should not be considered a surprise from a government that brought us pink batts and the fiasco that was Building an Education Revolution.

Poor language skills produce poor employment outcomes. Poor employment outcomes trap new migrants in welfare dependency and reinforce a sense of failure not just for new migrants and refuges themselves, but also in the wider Australian community which then in turn creates pressures on social cohesion.

Apart from its $220 million price tag, what is most galling about the extremely poor results being produced by the AMEP program is that while Labor is well aware of the consequential negative flow on effects from such a diabolically underperforming program it still persists with the same clunky template approach to service delivery.

The employment impacts of these failures were made clear to Labor in the Department of Immigration and Department of Immigration and Citizenship's own report, Settlement Outcomes for New Arrivals 2011, which found that 83.5 per cent of refugees were still on some form of Centreline benefit more than five years after arrival in this country.

Labor's lack of innovation in the settlement services space and its apparent inability to recognise the diverse needs of the different cultural backgrounds of new migrants and refugees to Australia has resulted in what are clearly less than acceptable outcomes.

While I say that Australia is arguably the world's most successful immigration nation, our success is not something we should take for granted nor should we be misguided about the reasons for our successes thus far.

Australia in 2012 is not the Australia of the 1950s. It's not the same Australia in which my parents arrived and worked their way to success. Australia is still the land of the fair go, but opportunities will only be realised by those who have a go. Our most successful immigrants have always understood, appreciated and celebrated this about Australia. It is this spirit of inclusiveness, participation and having a go that has made Australia great and will ensure we remain great into the future. This is why as a nation we must find ways to assist new migrants and refugees to succeed, to help them participate and contribute to Australian society – trapping them in welfare dependency as Labor seems content to do is not the way forward.