Andrew Leigh (Fenner, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Productivity, Competition, Charities and Treasury) Share this | Hansard source

Last weekend, a handful of speakers stood on the steps of our cities and shouted slogans against immigration. Their words weren't new. Some echoed the racist cries that have haunted Australia since the days when the White Australia policy was law. But their vision of a closed, fearful country isn't the Australia we live in today, because modern Australia is a multicultural success story. Nearly one in two Australians either was born overseas or had a parent who was. My wife was born overseas, so that includes our three children. Australia is home to hundreds of ancestries and we speak hundreds of languages in our homes.

Surveys show that nine out of 10 Australians believe multiculturalism is good for Australia. Think of Frank Lowy, who arrived as a refugee from Hungary and went on to co-found Westfield; Tan Le, who came as a Vietnamese boat person at age four and is today a global leader in neurotechnology; Anh Do, who fled war-torn Vietnam and became one of Australia's best-loved writers; or astrophysicist Brian Schmidt, who built a global team to win a Nobel prize. Consider sport. At the very moment anti-immigration rallies were taking place, the Sydney Marathon was being won by Ethiopia's Hailemaryam Kiros, who ran the fastest marathon ever on Australian soil, and Sifan Hassan of the Netherlands. As we waited in the starting pen I chatted with athletes from India, Spain and the UK. The biggest cheer was for Kenya's Eliud Kipchoge. My friend Arsenio Balisacan, a senior official in the Philippines government, was one of the many international runners who joined the race. That's what it means to be a World Marathon Major. You welcome people from around the world.

This weekend also saw the Canberra Raiders become NRL minor premiers for the first time in 35 years. The Raiders' line-up includes New-Zealand-born Josh Papalii, English-born Morgan Smithies and Samoan-born Ata Mariota. The Green Machine are stronger because they draw on migrant talent. Across the economy migrants are on average younger and more likely to start a business than Australian-born people are. They pay more in taxes than they draw in benefits. Migrants aren't just mouths to feed but muscles to build and minds to inspire. Our universities thrive because international researchers bring ideas and energy. Our hospitals and aged-care centres depend on migrant workers who care for our most vulnerable.

So, when the voices of hate call for exclusion, we must answer with evidence and with pride: pride for an Australia where people from around the world come together to build something bigger than themselves, pride in a multicultural nation that's more open, more dynamic and more generous than those who peddle fear will ever understand. That's the real story of Australian immigration—not division but unity, not weakness but strength.

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