CHECK AGAINST DELIVERY EMBARGOED UNTIL DELIVERY
SPEECH BY THE PRIME MINISTER
OPENING OF THE CYPRUS COMMUNITY CLUB OF NSW
STANMORE 12 MARCH 1989
Mr President,
Distinguished Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen.
Tonight's ceremony marks the sixtieth anniversary of your
club. Looking around your new club premises, I see the evidence of
the determination of the Cypriot-Australian community to
make the very best of life in this great country.
So in celebrating that landmark we are celebrating not just
an achievement by the Cypriot community of New South Wales
but indeed a genuinely Australian success story.
Australians and Cypriots have been in friendly contact for
many years now.
The first Cypriots attracted to Australia arrived in the
gold rush days of the 1850s.
In the sixty years this club has been in existence the size
of the Greek Cypriot population in Australia has grown
substantially.
There are now very strong and very respected Cypriot
communities here in Sydney, in Melbourne and in the other
capital cities of Australia.
Indeed Australia is now the home of the world's second
largest Cypriot community outside Cyprus itself.
Many members of this community have made their mark as
entrepreneurs in business.
You have provided leaders in public affairs, most notably
Andrew and Theo Theophanous, who represent the Australian
Labor Party in respectively the Federal and Victorian
Parliaments. You can be proud in particular of Andrew Theophanous' work
as Chairman of the ALP Caucus Committee on Immigration and
Ethnic Affairs.
The role of community organisations like yours in Australia
is sometimes understated.
But you provide a crucial meeting place for
Cypriot-Australians.
The growth and popularity of the Cyprus Community Club is
testimony to your community's desire to maintain your
cultural heritage, as part of your new life in a new land.
At the same time, your generous donations each year to aid
cancer research clearly manifest a commitment to and
identification with the broader community.
I recall with pleasure my own visit to Cyprus in 1987 and
the talks I held with the then President Kyprianou.
Indeed it was a happy coincidence, in view of the large
Cypriot-Australian community, that as part of a longer visit
to the Middle East and Switzerland in late January and early
February 1987, my visit to Larnaca fell on January 26
Australia Day.
I also recall the const'ructive meeting I held in Canberra
last May with a delegation of Cypriot MPs led by Dr Vassos
Lyssarides, President of the House of Representatives.
And it is always a pleasure to meet Cypriot representatives
at Commonwealth meetings.
I share with you a deep concern for the situation in Cyprus.
The Australian Government continues to recognise the
Government of Cyprus as the sole legitimate Government in
Cyprus and has consistently and strongly supported the
sovereignty, independence, unity and non-aligned status of
Cyprus. The Australian Government has condemned vigorously the
Turkish invasion of Cyprus and is committed to pursuing a
peaceful resolution to the conflict and issues affecting the
people of Cyprus.
We remain willing to help, in particular though our
contribution to the United Nations' Peacekeeping Forces in
Cyprus. We are strongly of the view that the problems of Cyprus can
only be resolved through negotiations and dialogue.
While the Government regrets the circumstances that have
forced many people to leave Cyprus, we have never regretted
that you chose Australia as your new home.
Cypriots, and millions of other people from all parts of the
globe, have come to Australia to build a new home here.
Your efforts, dedication and commitment to your new home
have been vital to the foundation and maintenance of our
national prosperity.
It is largely in recognition of this vital contribution that
my Government so strongly supports the principles of
mult i cult u rali sin.
It is a source of great strength for our society that we
acknowledge and respect the cultural diversity of our nation
as well as accept the economic benefits which arise from the
immigration program.
In keeping with this commitment, my Government is developing
the National Agenda for a Multicultural Australia, a package
of principles and policy initiatives that will give tangible
expression and long-term direction to our commitment to
multiculturali sm.
When we release the National Agenda for a Multicultural
Australia later this year, the issues it addresses will set
a direction of lasting benefit for all Australians as we
approach the year 2000.
My Government will not retreat from its commitment to
multiculturalism. To do so as some of our opponents have done would be to
disown and offend all those Australians who have come here
from overseas and whose loyalty and commitment to this
country have never been questioned by me or my Government.
We are committed to making better use of immigrants' skills,
education and entrepreneurial drive.
We are committed to maintaining and developing our language
resources in order to advance Australia's trade, tourism and
diplomatic interests.
And we are closely examining the manner by which overseas
qualifications are recognised to ensure that the skills of
immigrants are more fully and more effectively utilised.
We intend to ensure that all eligible people have access to
Government services that barriers of language and cultural
difference are no longer sources of inequality and
injustice.
While we are intent on breaking down barriers to Government
services, so that no cultural group will be disadvantaged,
let me also make clear that, in Australia, social rights are
balanced by responsibilities.
And in saying this let me address quite directly the
concerns about multiculturalism that have been expressed
following certain recent highly publicised events in this
country.
Angry demonstrations against visiting Heads of Government or
State, such as Prime Minister Thatcher and President
Sartzetakis; incitement to religious bigotry, such as that
recently directed at Jewish Australians; violent reactions
to protests at consulates; and threatened violence against
authors and booksellers events such as these have been
perceived or alleged to be somehow a consequence of
Australia's policy of multiculturalism.
Let me say at the outset that such events are thoroughly
unacceptable to me and to the Government. They are
repugnant and in a clear sense of the word, they are
un-Australian.
People are right to be concerned if they apprehend that
multiculturalism means that the conflicts of another
continent and another age can be imported, perpetuated and
pursued in this country. We do not ask people to forget
their past, but we do require them to express their concerns
within an Australian framework of law and tolerance.
Therefore I want to set the record straight for the benefit
of those who misunderstand or misrepresent multiculturalism.
Let me say it quite unequivocally and unambiguously:
multiculturalism is not a licence to stray beyond the law,
least of all to threaten the property or life of any other
human being, be they Australian, British or any other
nationality. Let us recognise the regrettable truth that cultural
conflict and ethnic rivalry, not infrequently accompanied by
violence, is a fact of Australian history. It existed long
before the word multiculturalism was heard and indeed long
before the era of post-war immigration. I need refer only
to the experience of Aborigines, the Chinese, the Irish and
the Jews during the first 150 years after European
settlement. Now, as then, the use or threatened use of violence remains
anathema to the very concept of the rule of law and the
right of the individual to its protection. It is also
totally unacceptable in terms of multiculturalism which,
above all else, espouses the virtues of tolerance.
The right to the free expression of opinion, within the
constraints of the law, works both ways. Freedom of
expression is founded on the same principle as the right to
disagree with what is expressed. As I said in Parliament
last week, Australia sets the highest value on the rights of
individuals to express their views freely and without fear
of recrimination providing all parties stay within the
limits imposed by the laws of this country.
At its core, multiculturalism is about tolerance tolerance
of diversity, of individuality, of difference. Tolerance
means nothing if it is confined to opinions with which one
agrees. Multiculturalism is the enemy of intolerance it
is the natural ally of those of us who cherish freedom and
individuality, the right to be different, the right to a
fair go, the idea of Jack being as good as his master in
other words, the very core of what it means to be an
Australian. I had not intended to inject a partisan note into this
event, but I cannot let pass without comment a recent
statement by-the Opposition Leader, Mr Howard.
In a radio interview on Friday, Mr Howard has, apparently
mischievously, distorted an important element of the
Parliamentary statement I made on the important issue of The
Satanic Verses.
In Parliament last week, I said:
" this Government was not one which was demanding
adherence to one set of values. That is not the sort of
society Australia is. But that does not mean that there
are not values to which we have the strongest commitment
and, in particular, we have the commitment to the right
to speak freely without fear of violent reprisal or
threat."
I would have thought those words were beyond
misunderstanding. Indeed I said at the time that I thought
both sides of Parliament held that value as fundamentally
important. But to my astonishment, I find Mr Howard has decided to
pretend that what I said was that " we don't require any
basic set of values in this country". He actually claimed
in this interview that " the thinking behind [ my] answer was,
we don't really require certain basic things"
I can't believe Mr Howard misheard the full comments I made
in Parliament. After all, he sits only a few feet away from
me. He had the opportunity, then, to dissent but, as one
would indeed expect, all the indications from the Opposition
were of agreement with what I said.
So I have to conclude that this later distortion of what I
said is a deliberate attempt to make it seem I stand on the
side of those who advocate violence in Australia. And I
conclude too that it is a foolish attempt by Mr Howard to
throw fuel onto the fire of this regrettable affair of The
Satanic Verses. It is not only foolish it is utterly
contemptible. So let me repeat, at least for Mr Howard's benefit, what I
have said before as to the limits that exist on
multiculturalism.
First, all Australians must accept the basic structures of
Australian society that includes the rule of law,
Parliamentary democracy, and English as our national
language. Second, the right to express one's own culture and beliefs
within this framework involves a reciprocal responsibility
to accept the right of others to express their views and
values. Third, multiculturalism assumes an overriding and unifying
commitment to Australia, to its interest and future. This
means, in part, that the conflicts and rivalries of the old
world must yield, in the final analysis, to our common
identity and our common loyalty as Australians first and
foremost.
Within these limits, all Australians are free to express,
preserve, develop or share such of their individual heritage
and experience as they wish. Indeed, it is this freedom,
and the tolerance it presumes, that is one of the most
potent sources of loyalty to this great country of ours. It
is the very basis of our social cohesion. Those who would
circumscribe or compromise that freedom whatever side of
the religious or political fence they come from do this
country, and themselves, a great disservice.
Ladies and gentlemen,
Cypriots who have made their home in Australia have
certainly made good their commitment to Australia.
Tonight's function is a gathering of Australians who share a
common commitment to the future of Australia.
This new club is a just reward for what you have achieved
and will serve as a reminder to you all of the significant
contribution you have already made and will continue to make
to Australia.
I congratulate everyone involved with the organisation of
this evening's celebration.
I have much pleasure in declaring these new club rooms open.