Julie-Ann Campbell (Moreton, Australian Labor Party) Share this | Hansard source

I'm incredibly proud to be one of the 15 per cent of Australians of Chinese heritage in my local electorate on Brisbane's south side—Moreton. My family immigrated to this country from China in the late 1800s. My gong gong's family, the Moo family, came to Darwin first. We suspect that perhaps their name wasn't originally spelt or pronounced 'Moo', m-o-o. My po po's family immigrated again at the same rough time to Melbourne—the Lau Gooey family. We suspect that that name may not have been spelt g-o-o-e-y. This was the world that my family came into. It has been almost 150 years that they've been here, and there are so many different families with a similar story to mine. People from different multicultural backgrounds contributing to our economy, contributing to our culture, contributing to our society—that is something that continues.

But there was a break. Can I tell you—in 1901 the doors were shut to people who looked like me. The doors were shut to people who looked like my family. In December 1901, the Immigration Restriction Act came into law. It was among one of the first pieces of legislation that was introduced. It was designed to limit non-British migration to Australia, and it represented the formal establishment of what we now know as the White Australia policy. The act gave immigration officers the power to make any non-European migrant sit a 50-word dictation test—initially in any European language and, after 1905, in any prescribed language, with languages chosen at the discretion of the immigration officer. It was easy to ensure failure for migrants deemed undesirable—failure of people who looked like me. The test was administered 1,359 times prior to 1909, with just 52 people granted entry to Australia. After 1909, not a single migrant made to sit the test passed it. This is our history. It's something that we must remember.

After World War II, the Chifley government began to relax the policy to allow refugees from continental Europe to come to Australia. This included those who fit the image of White Australia and that ideal but also migrants from other backgrounds in regulated numbers. In the 1970s the Whitlam government, a Labor government, completely eliminated it.

The first piece of federal legislation to make racial discrimination unlawful in Australia was the Racial Discrimination Act. It was introduced by the Whitlam government and passed on 11 June 1975. Today and this year, we celebrate its 50th anniversary. It makes it against the law to treat someone unfairly because of their race, because of their colour, because of their descent, because of their national or ethnic origin or immigration status. It is rooted in the idea of fairness and that it doesn't matter what colour your skin is. You should be treated equally. For employment, it prohibits discrimination during job advertisements, recruitment, selection processes, training, decisions, promotions and employment terms. In services, it makes it unlawful for service providers, including banks, insurance providers, government departments and transport providers, to discriminate against someone based on their race. In housing, it makes it unlawful to discriminate in renting or in buying.

In 1995, we saw amendments to this act, amendments on racial vilification, to make it unlawful in section 18C. These laws, all of them, are important, but they are not enough, because laws are not enough to change something. Laws help us set the framework to get there, but it is all of us who must make them real, who must bring them to life, who must ensure that those fundamental values of fairness, of equality, are upheld every single day, not just when we put an act through the parliament. This act is underpinned by those principles, of equality, of fairness.

Australia has the world's oldest continuous culture, as well as non-Indigenous Australians, who identify with over 300 different ancestries. It is estimated that, before British colonisation, over 250 First Nations languages and 800 dialects were in use in this country. Over 29 per cent of Australia's population was born overseas and 48 per cent of Australians have a parent born overseas. The top five countries of birth in Australia by number in 2021? England, India, China, New Zealand, Philippines.

I am incredibly proud to represent the most multicultural electorate in all of Queensland. My electorate has 39 per cent of people who were born overseas. And can I tell you that Australia is absolutely a multicultural success story? It's a multicultural success story, and, whether you call that a melting pot or whether you call it a salad, we are stronger for it. We're stronger for it because our differences—our differences in terms of experiences, what we bring to the table—make us collectively better. They make us collectively better, because it's not only those differences that we bring that make us stronger; it's also the fact that we share fundamental values as Australians that sits behind that and drive us together as a country to make it stronger.

As I said before, legislation in this space is necessary but insufficient. We can never take for granted the tapestry that we have woven when it comes to our multicultural country. The concern that I have at the moment is that there are people who are pulling at the threads of that tapestry. There are people who are picking away at that and want to make the multicultural success something of the past. It starts as a dog whistle, but it ends with a drumbeat.

I grew up in the 1990s in Queensland. It was a time when Pauline Hanson and One Nation held 11 seats in the parliament out of 89. And, when you do the math, that's a lot. It was a time when I came to know what a dog whistle sounds like. And I think that, when you look like me, you do know what that sounds like. When you look like Minister Aly, you do know what that sounds like. So I did actually want to talk about something that the minister says, because I think it is a really important point when it comes to multiculturalism in this country.

The minister talks about going beyond the concept of food when we talk about multiculturalism. I want to explain this. It's the idea that, when you stand up for multiculturalism, you stand up against racism, and you stand up for that melting pot that we are so proud of. It is nice to talk about food and how good all of the different types of cuisine that we get from across the globe are, but it is not enough. It is nice to talk about colour and vibrancy and clothing from all of the many parts of our globe, but it is not enough. It is nice to talk about the beautiful dancing and music and culture that so many different communities bring to our community, but it is not enough. When we support our multicultural communities, when we stand against racial discrimination, we have to back them in, not just with words, not just with niceties, but with action. I say to our multicultural communities, to those who have experienced racial discrimination, to those who have experienced the hurt that can come from people treating you differently for the way you look: Labor stands with you. We stand with you not just today, as we celebrate an important milestone with the Racial Discrimination Act, but we stand with you every single day, and we will back you.

Anniversaries give us the opportunity to reflect. They acknowledge those, from First Nations people through to a myriad of ethnic communities, who have made a difference and a big impact on this country economically, socially and culturally. We all make a difference—individuals, community organisations and government. I see this every day in my electorate of Moreton. But this anniversary is also a reminder that we must continue to fight for what we believe in when it comes to racial discrimination.

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