Mr HAMILTON (Groom) (09:53): ‘We will decide, and nobody else, who comes to this country. We’ll be compassionate, we will save lives and we’ll care for people.’ With those words in 2001, Prime Minister John Howard set out his vision for Australia’s immigration and refugee program. With strong borders and a strong economy, Howard believed Australia could achieve a cohesive future both for those who are here and those who are yet to come.
In 2014, alerted to the pending destruction of some 4,000 Iraqis, Syrian Christians and other minorities, including the Yazidi people, at the hands of ISIS, Prime Minister Tony Abbott fulfilled Howard’s promise and confirmed with a simple statement: ‘We will save those people.’ And save them we did. The ADF sent in helicopters to the top of Mount Sinjar, where thousands of Yazidis were preparing themselves for a most terrifying and violent end. We saved them. We brought them home—to a new home here in Australia—and I’m proud to say that many of those who were rescued that day and others who fled from ISIS in the subsequent troubles that beset the Middle East have settled in my hometown of Toowoomba. Of an evening, we hear them play soccer and volleyball in Newtown Park in my own neighbourhood. My own children often play with them, completely unaware of the very unlikely past that brings them together. It’s a great Australian story, and it’s a timely reminder of how, when you’re in control of your borders and in control of your immigration program, you can extend the fullness of the nation’s kindness, care and compassion to those who are most in need.
The presence of the Yazidi in Toowoomba is a great legacy of the Liberal Party and of the coalition and one that, since coming to this role, I’ve sought to enhance. In 2021, it was raised with me that funding the Toowoomba Refugee and Migrant Support Service, or TRAMS, was due to expire. This funding had been secured by my predecessor, John McVeigh, under the Settlement Engagement and Transition Support program, SETS. It was crucial that this TRAMS funding be extended because of the specific nature of the trauma that Yazidis had gone through. It’s hard for us now to take ourselves back and remember the horror and the gore that ISIS brought to the world, but the Yazidi will never forget. They most certainly are getting on with their lives. They’re studying, starting careers and injecting themselves into our community. They’re doing all that a nation could ask of any group of citizens. But it’s only 10 years since these horrors, and they still need some support. I believe that, when we chose to bring them here, we also took on the responsibility of helping them to settle.
Since 2021, I’ve advocated for an extension to the TRAMS funding, and today I heartily commend the government for committing to an extension of that funding. Australia is not a racist country as some at the ABC would have you believe. We are a very compassionate country that readily extends the hand of friendship to people around the world, particularly in their hour of need. I congratulate the minister, the Prime Minister and his government. I congratulate all those who have fought for this outcome, particularly CatholicCare CEO Kate Venables for her enduring efforts. I also want to thank the Leader of the Opposition, Peter Dutton, for his work as immigration minister during those times, ensuring that those people could come to Australia.
