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Legislative Assembly for the ACT: 2001 Week 10 Hansard (29 August) . . Page.. 3650 ..

MS TUCKER (continuing):

sort of inequity is increasing, and we have the statistics to prove it. I remember Mr Humphries denying that, and I had to come into this place with surveys and research to show that there is growing inequity in the Australian community.

When there is division between those who have and those who do not have, you have scapegoating of particular groups, which is then popularised by particular political groups in the community. It is happening all over the world. It is the tool of the right. We are all very familiar with it.

I understand multiculturalism to mean a community that is rich and diverse, with its ethnic groups offering the whole community what their culture brings. It is not about the other people who are not us. It is about many people from different ethnic backgrounds working, living and playing in our society as a group, with their particular rich cultures intact as well as moving with what is happening around them. If you want that, then you have to understand the importance of having equal opportunities in the community. If you do not have equal opportunities and if governments create inequity, you will get scapegoating. Policies of this government and the federal government have not recognised that.

The education report of this Assembly said that we see the school experience as a key opportunity to challenge the prejudices in the broader community through knowledge and understanding that people can be different and that it is okay to be different. It is also about recognising the school system, the public school system in particular, as the key opportunity for us to equalise opportunity as much as we can, to address the inequities in the backgrounds children come from. It is important to acknowledge those structural issues.

Mr Humphries quoted Dr Martin Luther King as saying that people who feel they have a stake in society do not want to destroy it. That has clearly come out of all the work we have done in the committee here and in all the other research about how you address and improve community wellbeing.

I find it a little interesting that Mr Humphries should refer to our sister city relationship with Beijing and China hosting the Olympics as an example of this government's commitment to multiculturalism. This debate is about acceptance, tolerance and freedom to be who you are. We know that Beijing have used their winning of the right to host the Olympics as legitimisation from the international community for their crackdown. They have said so in the media. They have said, "The international community has supported our crackdown, on Falun Gong practitioners in particular."

We know that there are business men and women in Canberra who will not be able to go to China to promote the business goals of this government. A businessman in this city could not even meet the new ambassador because he practises Falun Gong. So I think Mr Humphries needs to rethink his position that somehow this is entirely consistent with his commitment to the principles of acceptance and freedom of communities and ethnic groups to be who they are. Surely that has to be extended to the right and freedom to practise your religious belief, or your meditation exercises, as is the case with Falun Gong.

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