HREOC Website: Isma - Listen: National consultations on eliminating prejudice against Arab and Muslim Australias

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|| Meeting Notes: 29 April 2003

Consultation with Arabic Workers
Network, Bankstown, 29 April 2003

The meeting was facilitated
by Omeima Sukkarieh and Susanna Iuliano from HREOC and was attended by
12 participants from the Arabic Workers Network. The network is convened
by the Australian Arabic Communities Council to encourage workers whose
clients are members of Sydney's Arabic community to exchange information
and develop skills through regular bi-monthly meetings, information sessions
and training workshops. The network is comprised of approximately 190
members.

1. What are your experiences
of discrimination and vilification?

Participants responded
to this question personally and professionally. All participants reported
that discrimination was a problem for their clients. In some cases participants
were also personally affected by discrimination and vilification because
of their religion and/or ethnic background.

Discrimination
is happening personally and to clients on a daily basis, particularly
women in hijab or those with different names ...

I see and smell
discrimination every morning, every day - in government, on public transport,
in cabs ...

Discrimination
is definitely happening - especially against Muslim women in hijab who
try to get services from mainstream service providers.

Discussion of discrimination
alternated between the personal and professional experiences of participants
in a range of different contexts.

At work

One participant felt
the acute impact of September 11 in her workplace, a federal government
agency. "People I worked with didn't want to look at me or talk to
me. " As the only veiled Muslim women in her office, she had felt
socially excluded at work prior to September 11 2001. However, the terrorist
attacks brought problems with colleagues to the fore forcing her to take
a week of stress leave. She raised the problem of her social exclusion
with her supervisor who took action by delivering anti-discrimination
training to all workers in the office. The anti-discrimination training
had been available at this workplace for some time, but was not actually
implemented until after September 11, 2001. The worker felt this was a
case of 'too little too late' and subsequently left the employer.

Another participant,
a Muslim woman who works for the New South Wales Department of Public
Prosecutions reported an incident where, after setting off a scanner entering
a Court, she was told jokingly by a security guard to 'take out her
weapons. ' Offended by the comment, she reported the security guard
to his manager and the guard was 'spoken to.' Part of the reason she was
so offended by the guard's comments was the lack of respect for her professional
status that she felt was implicit in his derisive remark. "I was not
seen as a professional because I wear the hijab".

Recognition of overseas-qualifications
of Arabic-speaking clients was also a major issue raised by participants.
Even if overseas qualifications were recognised in Australia, participants
felt that Australian employers were reluctant to hire people without local
experience.

Arabic speaking
people are not getting further in employment. We have anti-discrimination
laws but it doesn't help with recognition of overseas qualifications...
There are a lot of people working in jobs not suited to their qualifications
- people with PhDs are working as cleaners.

The migration
system raises expectations about the kind of work you can get - but
lack of local experiences means that people can't get into those jobs.
No local experience - no job.

The universities
might accept a degree from overseas, but employers don't ...

While no participants
explicitly stated that these problems were unique to the Arabic-speaking
community, one participant summed up the specific impact on Arab Australians:

Middle-class
Arabs are becoming working class in Australia and working class Arabs
are becoming an underclass.

Participants felt
that a consequence of discriminatory hiring practices and failure to recognise
overseas qualifications was a lack of workplace diversity, particularly
at management levels.

There is no
diversity of representation in schools, on Councils or at higher levels
in Government. Diversity is not reflected at a managerial level.

At school

One participant was
involved in working directly with young girls of Arabic background in
a public school in Western Sydney as part of a NSW Department of Education
and Training funded 'Links to Learning' program. 'Links to Learning' projects
operate in New South Wales for either students who are at risk of leaving
school early, or for young people who left school early and are not in
training or employment.

The youth worker
noted that Arabic girls at this particular school were angry following
the September 11 attacks and the Lebanese gang-rape crisis in Western
Sydney and wanted to discuss these issues in a group. The worker was discouraged
from leading such a group discussion by the school unless supervised by
another teacher. In this and other instances, the worker felt hampered
and disempowered in her work with Arabic girls by the school management.

In the street or on public
transport

Participants reported
that women who wear hijab appear to be most affected by discrimination
in public places.

Discrimination
is happening to mothers in streets, in shopping centres and on public
transport ...After September 11, just reading the expressions of other
people on public transport made my wife feel very uncomfortable. The
discrimination is not overt - it's underlying. You wish people would
just say honestly 'we don't like you'.

One young, female,
Muslim participant reported 3 separate incidents of verbal harassment
from fellow passengers that happened to her on the bus in Parramatta.
On one of the occasions, she approached the bus driver in tears but was
ignored by him. This and other experiences prompted her to assert, "I
just want to be left alone".

Another young Muslim
woman reported feeling less secure when travelling outside of her own
neighbourhood (Bankstown) to other Sydney neighbourhoods where there are
fewer Muslim women. Although less than 10 kilometres separates Bankstown
from Kogarah, she felt that "leaving Bankstown to go to Kogarah was
like going to a war zone" and reported being spat at on the street
in Kogarah and targeted by security guards at the Kogarah train station.

In the media

Most participants
felt that media misrepresentations of the Arabic and Muslim impacted directly
on communities exacerbating divisions between groups and fostering racism
in the wider community. One member of the network was actively monitoring
the print media for articles which portrayed Australian Muslims in a negative
light.

One participant was
particularly incensed by a specific case of media misrepresentation that
occurred in the immediate aftermath of September 11, 2001. A news broadcast
reporting the September 11 terrorist attacks on a commercial network in
Sydney showed a background image of Australian Muslims allegedly 'celebrating'
the terrorist attacks. However, the pictures purporting to show Muslims
celebrating September 11 were taken during the previous year's Eid celebrations:
the network had broadcast the images out of context without any explanation.

Other

Participants were
keen to point out examples of institutionalised racism - a problem they
regarded as more insidious and enduring than instances of discrimination
or vilification on the street.

The problems
didn't start on September 11 - the problem is institutional and it's
been going on since the establishment of Australia.

I am always
expected to defend, clarify and justify everything to 'them' - 'them'
being not just 'Anglos' but also migrants and government departments.

There's not
just discrimination at a grass roots level, but in institutions like
Government departments, schools, Councils, in the media.

Housing

One participant raised
the issue of discrimination in the housing rental market and recounted
how he had personally been discouraged by a landlord from putting in an
application to rent an apartment after responding to a series of questions
about his background.

I applied to
rent a unit from a Greek landlady. The first question was 'where are
you from?' I said, 'I am Palestinian.' She asked, 'are you Christian
or Muslim?' I replied, 'I am Muslim'. Then the landlady said that the
flat was not suitable for me and refused to rent it to me.

Police

There was some brief
commentary on police relations with the Arabic community in New South
Wales. Some participants discussed feedback they had received from young
Arabic males about being 'over-policed' with regular searches and car
checks. Another participant relayed how her clients felt that police were
non-responsive to Arabs and would not come out if they were called about
noise or neighbourhood disturbances. One participant also raised the issue
of 'ethnic descriptors' used by the police when releasing information
about crime suspects or missing persons to the media in order to help
them identify suspects or locate missing persons. The worker felt that
the use of ethnic descriptors in report of a public demonstration by youth
in Sydney had unfairly targeted youth of 'Middle Eastern' appearance.

Airports

One participant recounted
how a family member had been stopped and questioned and not allowed to
board a plane at Launceston airport because he was carrying what security
guards thought was a 'suspicious package' (which was a post-pac filled
with business papers).

Service Delivery

Delivery of social
services to migrants and refugees was an area of particular concern to
several participants involved in settlement work. One participant described
how the closure of several migrant resource centres in Sydney's west and
an impending cut to the number of bi-lingual community workers will impact
on Arabic refugees in particular. "Arabic refugees will have more difficulty
getting help from someone who speaks their language." These refugees
and migrants will then come to community organisations who can help in
their own languages but who may not necessarily have the resources to
cope with additional clients. The community worker had already seen an
increase in numbers of refugees seeking assistance. While working on settlement
issues, with Arabic refugees and migrants, one settlement worker noted
how, "people want to talk about other incidents of racism - in schools,
on the street. People are not feeling safe."

2. What is being done to
fight anti-Arab and anti-Muslim prejudice and discrimination?

Participants were
aware of a number of different initiatives undertaken by community and
government organisations to fight anti-Arab and anti-Muslim prejudice.

Community Initiatives

The Australian Arabic
Communities Council began a 'Racism Register' after 11 September 2001
to try to collate information from members of Sydney's Arabic community
about incidents of discrimination and vilification. One participant argued
that while the statistics generated by the register may be of interest
and use to government bodies such as HREOC and the New South Wales Anti-Discrimination
Board, they offer little practical assistance to community members.

People complaining
to the register are comforted but not satisfied. What will it do? People
need to feel a sense of justice.

Participants also
mentioned attempts by the AACC to institute a monthly 'media' dinner where
prominent members of the media were invited to a dinner to meet members
of the local Arabic community. The purpose of the dinners was to help
build networks and relationships with media and engage in constructive
dialogue. The AACC sent invitations to more than 20 media personalities
- none of whom it accepted the invitation. The initiative was then dropped.

The AACC also offers
cross-cultural awareness training to government departments and community
groups. While most participants agreed that cross-cultural training for
government service providers is a good thing, they cautioned that it not
a panacea for all problems.

Government strategies and
projects

Many participants
identified individual Living in Harmony grant projects such as the Melkite
Catholic Church in Greenacre's 'Sharing the Spirit of Harmony' project
and the St. George Migrant Resource Centre and Youth Zone Youth Centre
'Living in Harmony and Combating Racism Project'. While these projects
were seen as valued and welcome initiatives, there was more general criticism
of the Living in Harmony grants project and the focus on 'Harmony Day'
festivities.

'Harmony Day'
is too tokenistic - it doesn't necessarily cancel out the bigger political
picture.

The government
is dishing out money to individual organisations when ongoing projects
are more important.

3. What more could be done
to fight anti-Arab and anti-Muslim prejudice and discrimination?

Promoting positive public
awareness

Education
is the most important strategy for future chance. We need to work on
education for better outcomes in ten years time.

All participants
agreed that education was crucial to bringing about future, long term
change in attitudes towards Arab Australians. Education was seen as necessary
not just for young people in a school setting, but to a broader audience
of 'Anglo-Australians' and other migrant groups.

Challenging stereotypes

Challenging stereotypical
representations of Arabs in the Australian media was identified by all
participants as vital to overcoming prejudice and discrimination. Participants
felt this could be best done by identifying and engaging key spokespeople
(not necessarily just community members) from a variety of different fields
(sport, entertainment etc) to publicly support anti-racism campaigns.
Participants also felt there was a need for more positive and varied images
of Arabs and Muslims in the Australian media. One participant suggested
that Muslims should have a greater television presence, particularly on
children's television programs such as Playschool and Sesame Street.

You never see
pictures of girls in hijab on children's programs.

Why can't there
be a Muslim Wiggle?

Providing community support

The best
solutions are community generated solutions ...

Participants saw
the need for Arabic and Islamic lawyers, journalists, university students
to join together and network to advocate on behalf of the Islamic and
Arabic communities. Several workers also argued the necessity of providing
additional support to newly arrived migrants and refugees in the community.
They expressed the need for more interpreters - not just those with knowledge
of Arabic but those with specific knowledge of Iraqi and Assyrian dialects
- who could assist newly arrived migrants and refugees during the settlement
process.

Informing communities about
their rights

Participants felt
there was an urgent need for Arab and Muslim youth to be educated about
their rights. One participant suggested there should be closer links between
community organisations and bodies such as the New South Wales Anti-Discrimination
Board and HREOC to inform people about complaints processes and channel
complaints. A community settlement worker reported that migrants and refugees
from Arabic backgrounds are not getting information about complaints processes
- either internal complaints processes for service providers such as Centrelink,
or external bodies such as HREOC and the ADB. Not all participants agreed
that informing community members about complaints processes was a worthwhile
strategy, particularly if complaints processes required individuals to
make complaints.

Organisations
like HREOC have no power to initiate complaints on behalf of clients ...we
are marginalising people more if you don't allow organisations to take
up complaints on their behalf.

[Note: Under the
Racial Discrimination Act there is limited scope for making representative
complaints. However, generally speaking, the law only allows a person
to make a complaint on behalf of another if they are themselves 'aggrieved'
(ie they are personally affected or targeted) or if they belong to a trade
union that an 'aggrieved' person belongs to.]

Ensuring complaints are taken
seriously

Participants noted
the reluctance of members of the Arabic community who had experienced
discrimination or vilification to come forward and make formal complaints.
Lack of awareness of complaints processes was seen as one reason for the
paucity of complaints. As a remedy, several participants suggested that
bodies like HREOC and the NSW ADB should make complaints processes more
relevant and they should build more effective partnerships with community
organisations like the AACC.

One participant suggested
that the only way to encourage members of the Arabic and Islamic communities
to make formal complaints was to provide them with better outcomes. There
was strong criticism of HREOC's capacity to bring about satisfactory outcomes
for Islamic complainants by one participant, whose brother's complaint
was rejected by HREOC because the discrimination was due to religion and
did not happen in his workplace. [Note: The Racial Discrimination Act
does not outlaw discrimination on the grounds of religion unless it occurs
in employment].

Another migrant community
settlement worker also argued for more effort to ensure that internal
complaints processes within different government departments take complaints
from their Arabic clientele more seriously.