Lisa Chesters (Bendigo, Australian Labor Party) | Hansard source

Recently, during Refugee Week, I had the opportunity to attend and speak at the Bendigo Community Health Services Refugee Week event. It was an opportunity to celebrate the amazing contribution that local refugees had made to our community. I'm proud to represent an electorate that is growing in its diversity and becoming home to many people with a refugee background. Our Karen population now numbers over 3,000 and is growing weekly.

The government provides robust support for all of those refugees, ensuring that they have the skills and opportunity to transition to Australia and rebuild their lives with certainty. That commitment continues today to be funded by the SETS Program, the Settlement, Engagement and Transition Support Program. Locally, this funding has been received by two groups in my electorate that continue to deliver a wide variety of SETS programs. Key delivery partners in my electorate include Bendigo Community Health Services, the host of the Refugee Week events, who received just over $1 million in funding in the latest round. Loddon Campaspe Multicultural Services have also received just under $500,000 in funding to continue to do the work in this important space.

Many migrants and refugees have made important social and economic contributions throughout our nation's history, particularly in my electorate of Bendigo. A recently released AMES report spoke to the economic contribution that they have made to our community. Whether they arrive young and go on to establish fabulous careers in our health sector or whether they arrive older and fulfill positions in our manufacturing sector, they have made an outstanding contribution, and we thank them for choosing Bendigo and our town.

I do want to acknowledge the role that the City of Greater Bendigo has played in becoming a refugee welcome city. It is hard to believe that a town like Bendigo, with a small refugee community, would take such a step, but that is who they are as a community, reflecting the wishes and the needs of many of us locally.

A special shout-out goes to the many volunteers and community organisations that made a very cold week in Bendigo that little bit warmer by coming together to celebrate Refugee Week. This is another great opportunity to thank refugees for the amazing contribution that they make to our community and for sharing their culture with us. We are that much stronger by them sharing their culture. We are that much stronger by celebrating our diversity.

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