APRO FORUM

FECCA'S WEBSITE

We will be starting a new feature on our website called “Member Activities and Projects”. This feature will be used to augment our continued effort to publicize our Members activities and to disseminate information of what is going on around Australia with FECCA and its members. If you are interested, please contact Charles on policy@fecca.org.au.

• Please continue to visit our website www.fecca.org.au to keep in touch with our activities and learn how you can be involved in the work that we do.

• Become a member of our community and participate in our “Youth Talk” and “Youth Forum” online.

Ask us how by contacting MaryAnn on admin@fecca.org.au.

FECCA CONGRESS 2007

Australian cultural and social diversity
within a global context

With over 350 delegates and 61 speakers from all over Australia, the FECCA congress proved to be a big success.

The Chair, Ms Voula Messimeri set the tone early that resonated throughout the two days.

Exploring the themes

• Using today to shape tomorrow,

• Empowerment and inclusion, and

• Australia as part of the global village

the congress came up with several recommendations which will be posted on our website shortly, and also will be communicated to all our members. The presentations will also be posted on the website as soon as they are available.

To view the full range of speakers and panelists who were at the congress, visit the Congress website at www.fecca.org.au/congress.

The next e-bulletin will contain the Congress wrap-up and the full range of outcomes.

FECCA would like to extend their gratitude to all the Guests, speakers and delegates who attended. We also applaud MCoT for hosting the Congress, and for the work they put in to ensure that everybody’s experience in Hobart was a positive one. Finally, we thank our sponsors, partners, and members for their valuable contribution to this success.

INQUIRY INTO CITIZENSHIP TEST SUBMISSION

The citizenship test has been a major focus of FECCA since we hold the view that this test has the potential to introduce bias into the process of citizenship acquisition, and more so to those individuals from CLDB, which in turn will prevent them from full participation as members of our society.

FECCA has and will continue to express its concern on this issue and has in the past produced several media releases and a policy paper in relation to the citizenship test. We have also presented a submission to the discussion paper, and one to the on going Inquiry into Australian Citizenship Amendment (Citizenship Testing) Bill 2007 which FECCA played a role in calling for its setting up. FECCA also presented their views on this issue to the Senate inquiry at Parliament House on Monday 16, 2007. The transcript is now available on the Hansard website, and the submissions can be accessed through the FECCA website under “Polices and Submissions”, and under “Media Releases”. Visit our website for more details http://www.fecca.org.au.

IMPROVEMENTS TO AUSTRALIAN GOVERNMENT FUNDED
ENGLISH LANGUAGE TRAINING

FECCA also put in a submission to the Department of Immigration and Citizenship, on Improvements to the English Language Training in Australia. This can also be found on our website.

POLICY POSITION PAPERS

FECCA is working with its members to continue developing a range of policy papers for release. These cover a range of policy areas including:

• Empowerment and inclusion,

• Health,

• Ageing,

• Human rights and multiculturalism,

• Immigration and citizenship,

• New and emerging communities,

• Women, and

• Youth.

FECCA has and will continue to consult with the relevant parties in relation to these matters. We also await the outcomes of the FECCA Congress, which will inform the draft policies. Any progress will be communicated to our members, and will also be available on the FECCA website.

RECENT SUBMISSIONS / MEDIA RELEASES

• Improvements to Australian Government Funded English Language Training (18 June 2007)

• Inquiry into Australian Citizenship Amendment (Citizenship Testing) Bill 2007

• Media Release on Preserving Social Cohesion and Harmony (18 July 2007)

• Residency Test Needs Further Scrutiny (1 August 2007)

These can be downloaded from our website at www.fecca.org.au/submissions.cfm, for submissions or www.fecca.org.au/Media_Releases.cfm for the media releases.

MIGRANT RESOURCE CENTRE OF SOUTH AUSTRALIA

Community Capacity Building through the Refugee Women’s
Empowerment Program

The Migrant Resource Centre of South Australia (MRCSA) recognized the challenges new refugee women to SA are faced with on arrival. These women soon find that they are at the risk of being isolated due to the difficulties of negotiating their way in a consumer society.

The majority of these women arriving have lost their partners and/or members of their families and have often been rendered solely responsible for raising not only their own children but also of those family members and other individuals who were not fortunate enough to make it. These women come from countries where the rights of women and children are unknown or are not recognized, and do not understand their legal rights or their children’s rights in terms of privacy, being safe from discrimination and from mental, physical and sexual abuse. These and other traumatic events like war and civil disruptions that they have had to go through make them vulnerable.

The aims of the Refugee Women’s Empowerment Program is to assist the full participation of women new to Australia through multifaceted initiatives, including early intervention for women who have been identified as at risk and who have multiple needs. The program achieves this by training women from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds as mentors and carers to become key people in their community. It also assists them to engage with the mainstream - family support groups, advocacy and education groups whose role it is to progress these women’s issues through direct representation in decision-making.

The achievements of this initiative are becoming visible after four years of its initiation. The program has produced many advocates who themselves were recipients of the program.

Over one hundred key women a year organise African and Middle Eastern women’s forums and focus groups together with services that affect them, such as the Family Law Court and the Legal Services Commission. They have joined the SA Women’s Safety Strategy, not just as recipients, but as new and emerging community leaders, and a number of them have won awards for their community work. In terms of training and employment, they have undertaken driving courses, childcare; carers and interpreter courses and a considerable number - over 30% of the group in the program - are furthering their studies at TAFE and at universities as mature age students.

Several women have completed, or will complete, women’s leadership courses and a number of the young women have been selected onto the state Youth Parliament, whilst others are represented on hospital and other advisory committees. Many others have gained work experience and employment in diverse workplaces such as four star hotels, government agencies, health and carer’s professions, education and settlement services. The MRCSA takes great pride in recruiting about 50% of its workforce from such survivors and achievers as these women.

For more information about this program, please contact Eugenia Tsoulis OAM, Executive Director on eugenia@mrcsa.com.au.

MRCSA THIRD REGIONAL CONFERENCE

The Migrant Resource Centre of South Australia will be hosting their “Third Regional Multicultural Conference” on the 19-21 of September 2007. The conference will be at the City of Mount Gambier Civic Centre. For further details regarding papers, abstracts and registration please contact Eugenia Tsoulis OAM, Executive Director on eugenia@mrcsa.com.au.

ETHNIC COMMUNITIES' COUNCIL OF NSW

Asian Dry Cleaner Electricity Saving Project: Dry Cleaning Industry in NSW

The ECC NSW successfully secured funding from the NSW Government to conduct the Asian Dry Cleaner Electricity Saving Project (ADCES). The project was formally launched by The Hon Henry Tsang MLC, representing The Hon Phil Koperberg (Minister for Climate Change, Environment and Water) on the 21st of June.

According to the Dry-cleaning Institute of Australia, 80% of over 450 dry cleaners across NSW are run or owned by someone from an ethnic background, and half of them are from a none English speaking background, mainly Vietnamese and Chinese. The object of the program is to reach those “hard-to-reach” small to medium businesses and communicate to them the message on the need to save electricity in their work place. This is being archived mainly by providing bilingual information packages which have been developed in both Vietnamese and Chinese (who form the majority of the target group), on saving energy, operation costs and greenhouse gas emissions in the business, and offering incentives to encourage participation in ADCES. Those participating businesses will receive a free boiler, energy audit and technical assistance, as well as financial subsidies to help identify and implement energy efficiency measurements, such as fixing and repairing steam piping system problems, which result in the energy wastage.

It’s estimated that ADCES will reduce electricity peak demand by 800 kW, save 1,467 MWh of electricity and 1,445 tonnes of greenhouse gases annually, which is an equivalent of taking 321 cars off the road. According to the program coordinator Joyce Fu, “…by removing heat loses through problems with pipe works and boiler systems, energy savings of between 10%- 20% could be gained” she said.

If you’ve got any inquiries, please contact the project coordinator, Ms Joyce Fu, at the ECCNSW office on (02) 9319 0288 or email: energy@eccnsw.org.au.

NATIONAL PRESCRIBING SERVICE LIMITED (NPS)

The National Prescribing Service Limited is launching a national
campaign called Get to Know Your Medicines. The campaign
which will be running from August to the end of the year, focuses on general issues around medicine use including how to talk openly with your doctor or pharmacist, understanding generic medicines, using the internet to find reliable health information, understanding medicine labels, remembering to take your medicine and whether new medicines are always better.

Watch out for the Get to Know Your Medicines television advertisements prompting viewers to call NPS Medicines Line (1300 888 763) and go to www.nps.org.au to download the Get to Know Your Medicines fact sheets or to find out about free medicines information sessions in their community and order free resources. For further information please contact Jackie Stephenson of NPS on jstephenson@nps.org.au.

ETHNIC COMMUNITIES' COUNCIL OF VICTORIA

On Tuesday 21 August, 2007, the Ethnic Communities Council of Victoria and the Spectrum Migrant Resource Centre (formerly the Northern Migrant Resource Centre) will be jointly hosting the 2nd Victorian Immigration & Settlement Conference. The theme this year is ‘Integration – Modern Multiculturalism or Assimilation?’ and it will be held at the Park Hyatt, East Melbourne.

The conference will consider the policy of “multiculturalism” being replaced by “integration” and what are the implications of this policy shift. The Conference will be of interest to government policy advisers, immigration lawyers, international NGOs, ethnic community leaders and peak ethnic community organisations, health and education providers and local Council and state government representatives interested in attracting new migrants.

Some of the highlights of the upcoming Conference include the following secured speakers

• International keynote - “Integration – Canadian style” by Sarah Wayland PhD – Author of Unsettled: Legal & Policy Barriers for Newcomers to Canada

• Australian keynote - George Megalogenis, author & senior writer, The Australian addressing “Integration - Modern Multiculturalism or Modern Assimilation?”

• Stephanie Lagos, CEO, Spectrum Migrant Resource Centre – “It’s the Economy, stupid! Why social integration can’t happen without economic integration”

• Phong Nguyen, Chairperson, Ethnic Communities Council of Victoria (ECCV), “Where to next on multiculturalism?”

The Major Parties answering- How does your Party define “Integration” – as “Modern Multiculturalism or Modern Assimilation”? And what will it mean for new and existing migrants?

• Hon. Teresa Gambaro, MP, Assistant Minister for Immigration & Citizenship

• Mr Tony Burke, MP, Shadow Minister for Immigration, Integration & Citizenship

• A panel of diverse speakers addressing the theme

Registration forms and a full program will be available from here shortly, but if you have any further queries, please contact Malyun Ahmed on (03) 9496 0200. Registrations close 10/08/2007. A list of sponsors will be announced shortly.

Visit the website for further details http://eccv.org.au/doc/PROGRAM&REGISTRATIONFORM.pdf

CHANGES AT THE FECCA NATIONAL SECRETARIAT

We have sadly farewelled:

• Sharon Ride - Senior Policy and Project Officer

And we’ll soon be farewelling Mark Kulasingham- FECCA Director, who will be leaving FECCA to become a fulltime Dad for a time.