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Commentary on: Access and Equity »

Prof Andrew Jakubowicz.

Text Commentary

Are the programs effective?

1984 - The Access and Equity strategy to ensure all government services meet the needs of a diverse population

Here you see Prime Minister Bob Hawke at the launch of the National Agenda for a Multicultural Australia in 1989, which grew out of the 1984 decision to develop an Access and Equity strategy. How should governments ensure that all Australians could get programs and services that really worked for them?

The Access and Equity strategy attempted to combine three ideas that had emerged over the previous years:

  • mainstreaming, by which was meant attempting to ensure that all government programs and services were capable of meeting the needs of a diverse population, without special “migrant” units;
  • participation, by which it was proposed that ethnic groups would be involved in advising government about the most appropriate ways to meet their needs;
  • equity, by which was meant people should have the reasonable expectation that their needs would be met by a system able to cope with their specific backgrounds (including ethno-specific services offered through community organisations supported by governments) and that the outcomes of these services would be fairly similar whether those using them were Australian-born or of non-English speaking background.

At the Commonwealth level these approaches came together under the name of Access and Equity, in New South Wales under the approach of Ethnic Affairs Policy Statements (EAPS), and in Victoria under Mainstreaming. Each approach had slightly different aspects, but they were all based on an assumption that government services were not working effectively for the culturally diverse community, and that those services had to change.

From 1985 onwards the Access and Equity strategy required that all Commonwealth government departments prepare Access and Equity Plans which would identify ways in which the department practices would change to make them more accessible and equitable. OMA took on the responsibility for monitoring the program in 1987, and it was extended in 1989. In 1992 an evaluation was carried out which proposed more detailed planning, evaluation, audit, and accountability elements. It stressed the crucial role of staff training, and the importance of consulting with client groups, ensuring adequate participation by representatives of the so-called “A and E target groups” in government advisory and review bodies and processes.

Writing of the process in 1995, Labor parliamentarian Andrew Theophanous indicated that the strategy was a crucial part of the social justice program of the Labor government. At both national and state levels there are many documents which explore the implementation issues for government. For the most part governments did not consider Access and Equity strategies for the non-government sector (compared with Affirmative Action for women, which does require private sector organisations to have affirmative action strategies).

Further reference:
Australia, Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Office of Multicultural Affairs Access and Equity: evaluation summary, 1992 (amended), Canberra, Australian Government Publishing Service, 1993.

Australia, Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Office of Multicultural Affairs “The Concept of Equity” in Access and Equity, Annual Report 1993, Canberra, Australian Government Publishing Service, 1993.

Australia, Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet, Office of Multicultural Affairs Achieving Access and Equity, A second edition guide for the Australian Public Service, Canberra, Australian Government Publishing Service, 1994.

Theophanous, Andrew Understanding Multiculturalism and Australian Identity, Melbourne, Elikia Books, 1995.