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George Lekakis on Victorian Multicultural Act

George Lekakis.

Victorian Multicultural Commission chair George Lekakis describes the Victorian Multicultural Act

Created:

unknown

Date Added:

03 March 2009

Source:

source not available

Format:

mov (Quicktime);

File size:

4.5 MB

Length:

01min48sec

Transcript

Lekakis:

00:10

... started to build up a momentum of relationships and that’s the critical key, in Melbourne for example, there’s a network amongst people who operate welfare programs. And those relationships are formed over the last 30 or 40 years. The same thing occurs within migrant communities, the ECC set the benchmark for people to cooperate with one another, to talk, to work out problems, to advocate for reform, to support one another, to learn from one another. The same in the interfaith area. Religious leaders at local levels are coming together, so you see interfaith networks occurring everywhere. Our job is to support all that.

00:47

And to keep the momentum going, maintain the relationships and keep the government agencies honest about responding to them. So hence the multicultural act which came about in difficult circumstances: there were national discussions about moving away from multiculturalism. There was reticence by – I always believed that if the head of the premier’s department, his mother could not speak English, we would have the best interpreting service in the world, right here in Victoria.

01:21

Because there’s something about multicultural affairs, you feel it, there’s a passion about it, because you’ve been privy to it. Now we were lucky enough to get an education to understand how the world works, or we hope to and marrying the passion and the injustices of the past, with what you want people to have for the future I think is a key aspect of how you develop policy.

01:48

End transcript