Adviser quits over Howard's asylum policy
By JULIE-ANNE DAVIES
Wednesday 23 January 2002
The Age
Stepping down: Neville Roach resigned from the Council for Multicultural Australia yesterday.
One of the Howard Government's most senior advisers on immigration resigned yesterday in protest over its handling of the asylum-seekers issue.
The chairman of the Council for Multicultural Australia and the Business Advisory Council on Migration, Neville Roach, has quit, saying the government's hard line and inflexible approach to immigration was causing serious damage to the nation's image.
Mr Roach told The Age he found it "impossible" to support the government and warned that Australia's multicultural fabric was being seriously eroded by current policies. "The main concern that I have with all the government's rhetoric is the serious damage it has caused to Australia's multicultural fabric."
Mr Roach is particularly critical of the government's treatment of asylum seekers, saying it had helped whip up racism in the community.
"Every time a humanitarian issue is raised in relation to the asylum seekers, their deviousness and even criminal intent is proclaimed," Mr Roach said.
"I think the way in which the government has handled these issues - beginning, I think, with the Tampa - has tended to give comfort to the prejudiced side of human nature. Compassion seems to have been thrown out the door."
Mr Roach, who is the deputy chairman of SBS and the chairman of Fujitsu Australia, has served the Keating and Howard governments.
The two councils, the CMA and the BAP, provide advice to government on multiculturalism and migration, reporting to the Prime Minister and the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs.
Mr Roach, who was born in India, has been a significant figure in the development of national policy on multiculturalism and migration in Australia. He said that in the current climate, the Business Advisory Council, which assists in bringing to Australia skilled and business migrants, would not be able to develop and as such should be wound back.
Mr Roach has also called on Immigration Minister Philip Ruddock to hand over responsibility for asylum seekers to another minister because, he argues, Australia's whole migration program was being tainted, giving it an "unwelcome and negative" image.
He met Mr Ruddock yesterday to advise him of his decision.
A spokesman for Mr Ruddock said last night that Mr Roach had played an integral part in developing the policies that were now in operation. "The policies and the way they have been applied are a result of the work done by committees Mr Roach has chaired," spokesman Steve Ingram said.
He disputed Mr Roach's claim that Australia's image was being tarnished, saying "our image stands up well in the eyes of the world".
In a statement released last night, Mr Ruddock paid tribute to Mr Roach, saying his contribution to promoting multiculturalism would be missed. "As chairman for the Council for Multicultural Australia he has highlighted the challenges that confront Australia as it pursues a more inclusive and harmonious society," he said.
Mr Roach, who was awarded an order of Australia for services to the community in the sphere of multiculturalism, accused the government of inflexibility. "It seems to have ceased being open to any opinion or advice that is contrary to what I believe is its inflexible approach," he said.
Mr Roach singled out the case late last year in which the government refused to guarantee re-entry to Australia for an Iraqi man whose three children had drowned after their boat sank en route from Indonesia. The government also refused to allow his wife to join him here.
Mr Roach said Australia's approach stood in sharp contrast to other governments that had shown greater compassion in cases of tragedy.
He said he had also been deeply disturbed by the government's claims before the last election of refugees throwing their children overboard.
Mr Roach said the government's tactics had affected not only the boat people but all other Middle Eastern people now living in Australia.
"Unfortunately, as recent events have shown us, Australians can also be influenced to have negative attitudes towards people who are different," he said.
"The government's approach and accompanying rhetoric in relation to asylum seekers has, in my view, contributed to this unfortunate outcome, because most of the asylum seekers are Islamic and originally from the Middle East.
"The greater tragedy is that the vilification, abuse and even violence that has resulted has not been directed exclusively towards asylum seekers but to the wider Islamic community and others of Middle Eastern appearance."
Mr Roach said the type of leadership shown by the Howard Government over the treatment of asylum seekers triumphed at the recent election. "I still believe that a different leadership approach, one that was less extreme and more humanitarian, could have won the day, especially if it came from a government that was known not to be soft or weak in its philosophic approach to this issue."
He also expressed concern at Australia's Family Reunion Program, which he said was hugely discriminatory to new migrants.
He was also critical of the government's refusal to embrace what he terms "symbolic reconciliation" with indigenous Australians.