The FitzGerald Report on Immigration Policy: Origins and Implications

The extraordinary paradoxes associated with the Committee to advise on Australia's Immigration Policies (CAAIP) can best be unravelled if we begin with the committee's origins. It was an outcome of ethnic community concern that 'their' communities were being prejudiced as the Hawke government sought to enlarge its immi gration program and make it more economically rational. Under Mr Hurford's direction the Department of Immigration and Ethnic Affairs (DIEA) had increased the numbers of immigrants in 1985 and 1986. But at the same time a new selection system was introduced in mid 1985 designed to select only the more qualified and 'employable' of brothers and sisters sponsored from Australia. Though this system was only partially successful in achieving this goal, it was seen by leaders of ethnic communities as challenging earlier gains. By late 1986 the ethnic press and politicians representing the ethnic com munities, particularly the Italian and Greek, were insisting on change. This pressure intensified after the August 1986 Budget, when the government decided to abolish the Australian Institute of Multicultural Affairs, to reduce funds for English language training and to raise the option of amalgamating SBS and ABC TV. These cuts involved three different federal departments (Immigration, Education and Communications). The fact that they all affected 'ethnic' areas was probably coincidental. Nonetheless leaders of ethnic communities felt under threat. Their reaction was to attack Hurford?to call