Labor has promised a multicultural review as part of a series of measures to address the gaps diverse communities face in accessing federal government services.
Senator Katy Gallagher and the shadow minister for multicultural affairs, Andrew Giles, said the pandemic had highlighted the problems diverse communities face.
“Australians from Cald [culturally and linguistically diverse] backgrounds are worse off under Scott Morrison, because it’s harder to access support and services they need,” Gallagher and Giles said in the statement.
“There have been consistent failures in translations of vital health information, while the government’s business support has often been inaccessible to new and emerging migrant groups.
“The fragmented and inconsistent approach to engaging with Cald communities has had devastating consequences for individuals, communities, and small businesses.”
Labor says it will also develop a whole-of-government standard for measuring Australia’s diversity, to better inform policy development.
The measures will also include an expansion of the availability of multilingual frontline staff, to provide more culturally appropriate health services.
The Coalition has pledged $5m to “multicultural and religious community groups” to improve safety at places of worship.
They have also pledged to invest $17.8m in mental health services for multicultural communities.
It comes nearly a year on from the Delta coronavirus outbreak in New South Wales, that resulted in many of the most diverse local government areas in Sydney going into lockdown.
Military personnel were deployed amid tough limits on movement, exercise, masks and shopping in some of the most diverse areas in Australia.
The chief executive of the Federation of Ethnic Communities’ Councils of Australia (FECCA), Mohammad Al-Khafaji said the heavy-handed approach toward diverse communities exposed “holes” in the government’s approach.
“The pandemic, and the lockdowns in particular, exposed numerous holes in the government’s approach to engaging with multicultural communities,” he said.
“Overall, it became clear that the needs of culturally and linguistically diverse people in Australia were mostly an afterthought when designing and implementing services and programs.”
“We saw constant errors in translations, but even worse, we saw that translating existing information was the beginning and the end of many engagement strategies. Despite making up around half of the population, engaging with multicultural communities always seemed to be an afterthought or a nice-to-have.”’
Al-Khafaji backed Labor’s plan for a multicultural framework review, saying it was “long overdue” and that multicultural communication strategies were also due for reform.
He said adding multilingual frontline workers should only be the beginning, saying such strategies should apply to all levels of government.
“FECCA hopes that any such policy goes beyond just frontline staff and includes strategies for more culturally diverse staff at all levels of government services, agencies, and departments.
“We want to see multicultural and multilingual people making decisions and designing services, not just delivering them.”
