Living & Working in Australia

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		Living & Working in Australia

		Everything You Need to Know for Building a New Life

		Laura Veltman

		6th edition

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Contents         
               
        List of Illustrations         
        
               
        6         
               
        Preface to the Sixth Edition         
        
               
        7         
               
        1
First: The Good News         
        
               
        9         
               
        2
Great Expectations         
        
               
        16         
               
        3
Australia The Making of a Nation         
        
               
        21         
               
        4
Attitudes Down Under         
        
               
        29         
               
        5
Australia How Will You Get In?         
        
               
        43         
               
        6
Foreign Qualifications and Studying in Australia         
        
               
        78         
               
        7
Taking it All With You         
        
               
        90         
               
        8
Housing and Property         
        
               
        107         
               
        9
Playing Down Under         
        
               
        120         
               
        10
Driving in Australia         
        
               
        141         
               
        11
Health and Welfare in Australia         
        
               
        152         
               
        12
Education in Australia         
        
               
        160         
               
        13
Money and Making it         
        
               
        175         
               
        14
Working for a Living Locations and Incentives         
        
               
        182         
               
        15
Taxation and Company Law         
        
               
        216         
               
        16
The Slanguage: An Introduction to Australian Slang         
        
               
        233         
               
        Further Reading         
        
               
        238         
               
        Useful Addresses and Contacts         
        
               
        240         
               
        Index         
        
               
        251

[ 本帖最后由 kennyxue 于 12-10-2009 09:11 编辑 ]

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List of Illustrations        
               
        1
Sample Prices in Australia        
       
               
        92        
               
        2
Average Weekly Rents for a Three-Bedroom House 199798        
       
               
        109        
               
        3
Average Annual Face Value of Commercial Rents        
       
               
        110        
               
        4
Average House Prices        
       
               
        112        
               
        5
An Aussie Real Estate Dictionary        
       
               
        118        
               
        6
Map of Australia        
       
               
        140        
               
        7
Samples of Immigrant Investment Ventures        
       
               
        186        
               
        8
Samples of Queensland Enterprises Seeking Funding        
       
               
        192

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Preface to the Sixth Edition        
               
        Welcome to the latest edition of Living and Working in Australia! In the past ten years things have certainly changed Down Under and this sixth edition marks a decade of tracking those changes and how they may affect people like you, who are keen to consider the benefits and drawbacks of the move to Australia. Whether your time in Australia would be permanent, or as a holidaymaker, or as a temporary resident, there are plenty of facts and foibles about your intended destination that I hope make this book worth reading.        
               
        The Sydney 2000 Olympic Games are a boon both for newcomers and for locals of this sports-mad, tourism-friendly nation, and one more excellent reason for people to consider a temporary or permanent stay in Australia. Certainly, the new millennium holds much promise for Australia and Australians, with the diverse cultures, landscapes and climates that are part of the wonderful backdrop of living and working in Sydney, Perth, Hobart, Darwin or somewhere in between.        
               
        Politics and economics are central to Aussie society, and the activities of those in government, as well as the management of what is undoubtedly a wealthy and talented society, are engrossing subjects for the average and sometimes cynical Australian. After all, most Australians must work, vote and spend money in between trips to the bush and beach.        
               
        I hope you enjoy the Australian experience as much as I do. All the best in your plans to make the most of your time here.        
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        LAURA VELTMAN

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First: The Good News        
               
        There are so many tall tales about Australia including the myth that it's impossible to get in. Yet doors are positively flung open to the 'right' kind of people, with an awareness of how to present their case. For Australia seeks to skim off the cream of applicants from other countries. With changes in the economy and pressure on migration policy, the number of people allowed in has decreased in the past ten years, and now stands at about 85,000 annually. It is usually necessary to have a very close relative, a job or a business opportunity waiting for you Down Under if you seek to live there permanently, but there is flexibility for those who want to live and work or study in Australia on a temporary basis.        
               
        Perhaps you are thinking of leaving the uncertainties and rigidities of your home behind, and restarting a career or business in a better place?        
               
        Maybe the notion of almost year-long warmth and sunshine appeals to your body and spirit? Do you hope to live and work in an environment like Australia's on a temporary basis either for the adventure or as a test run?        
               
        Do you have family living there whom you'd like to join when you retire, or are you simply considering Australia as a chance to change your lifestyle, while investing your financial assets so that you can afford to live well without having a regular job?        
               
        Is there a course of study you'd like to take in one of the many universities or tertiary colleges Down Under? Are you planning to travel the country in your holidays? Or do you have friends and relatives you'd like to see there, while earning money on an extended working holiday?

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Are the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney an incentive for you to visit Australia for any of the above reasons? Why not begin your temporary or permanent stay Down Under in the new millennium, using the opportunity to witness Olympic events as your springboard to a new experience, or even a new life?        
               
        The world sees Australia in an evermore positive light, as a desirable place to live or visit. For their part, Australians are more open to newcomers than ever before.        
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        The tough screening of migrants means that the successful applicants are widely recognised as a boon, both socially and economically.        
               
        However, the red tape and high application fees can be daunting for would-be temporary or permanent settlers and neither your time nor your money will be refunded if you are rejected.        
               
        It is vital to be prepared for the form-filling and interviews of the application procedure before you go, as well as to know what to expect on arrival. This book aims to be an entertaining guide to gaining residency and work permits. It also seeks to dispel some post-arrival fairytales and portray the lifestyle, social, education and business conditions you and your family might reasonably expect on making a move to Australia. So, before Australia makes up its mind about you, consider carefully whether your expectations of the place, people and lifestyle are realistic.

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Fairytales from the Land of Oz        
               
        Question: How can you tell that a planeload of moygrants is on the landing strip at Sydney Airport? Answer: After the engines switch off, the whining goes on ...        
               
        Australians have a veritable library of jokes about 'whining' immigrants. New arrivals have some dreams which come true and others which are swept away when they are confronted with real life Down Under.        
               
        Homesickness or culture shock are common reasons for complaint and rejection of life in Australia. After coping successfully with the hassles of migrating, a small number of people find themselves so traumatised they feel obliged to leave. Yet the inability to make 'a go of it' in Australia or in any unfamiliar environment is often due to insufficient planning of the move in advance.        
               
        The prevailing long-distance view of one of the Western World's most sought-after destinations is as the land of the Neighbours TV series, full of Ockers and Sheilas, Paul Hogans and Dame Ednas. So people who seriously consider living in Australia are often misled by myths. If you have never lived there, or simply visited as a tourist, Australia could seem a land of sunny opportunities which like the endless backyard swimming pools you see as your plane comes in to land in any Australian city go on and on as far as the imagination may stretch. Can you smell prawns sizzling on the barbecue, taste the cold beer and feel a fatter pay-packet in your pocket? Many dream of a country where lucky citizens occasionally take a break from sunshine, beaches and outdoor sporting events with sprees in luxurious air-conditioned shopping centres, to tuck into lobster at a seafront restaurant, or to spend time in the local pub, club, disco or theatre. Of course, the work ethic is a quirk of the 'old country', a weird nightmare, according to the popular mythology about the Land of Oz. Those ready to wrestle with the Aussie 'slanguage', to adopt the local drawl, embrace the notion of a classless society, and revel in the Great Outdoors (humidity, flies and mosquitoes notwithstanding), may conclude that Australia sounds like paradise ... a permanent holiday on earth, a land for adventurers convinced their 'old world' is running out of steam.        
               
        Such is the legend of life Down Under.        
               
        However, if seriously thinking about moving to somewhere that you naturally hope is a better place to live, put the myths aside (no need to forget them entirely since there's more than a grain of truth in most Aussie fairytales) and consider the facts of Australian life ... warts 'n' all.

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It's Not for Everyone        
               
        Though a host of international celebrities love to visit Down Under for work or pleasure and declare it an ideal place to live, it's worth noting that about 25,000 people leave Australia each year. Almost 20 per cent of people who settled in Australia since the mid-1980s left again within a decade while in recent years around 7 per cent of Australian born people emigrated to other places where they prefer to live and work. Consider how many famous Australians have moved away and find the thought of actually living in their birthplace uninspiring and even painful. Why have people like media magnate Rupert Murdoch, comedienne Pamela Stephenson, feminist writer Germaine Greer, entertainer Barry Humphries, and broadcaster Clive James spent much of their lives elsewhere or relinquished their citizenship rights entirely?        
               
        Blue Skies        
               
        In many ways, the wife of cricket star Ian Botham summed up the drawbacks of living in a land which so many former residents see as a nice place to visit but a bit dull in the long term. When Botham was keen to take up a lucrative cricketing contract to live and work (temporarily) in Queensland, his wife Kathy said from back home in Yorkshire, England: 'I spent four months (in Australia) once, and I was sick of all that blue sky and sunshine. I couldn't wait to get home'. Which proves that you can't please all the New Australians all the time.        
               
        Sunshine is certainly an attraction for many would-be settlers, though once again outsiders have unrealistic expectations of the weather assuming that it never rains, for example. In fact, it is a land of extremes. Much of Australia is desert, so most people live on the coast. But more than a quarter of the coastline is in the tropics. It can be sweaty, searingly hot and certainly not all fair weather. In the temperate zones where Sydney, Melbourne, Perth and Adelaide are located, it can rain heavily for days on end. People can be killed and properties ruined by flash floods that occasionally strike in the south and east of Australia, while cyclones can be a menace in the north and bushfires regularly decimate outlying suburbs of the coastal towns and cities.        
               
        Immigration Targets        
               
        Historically, Australia's migration philosophy was motivated by a

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'populate or perish' paranoia. Until the 1950s, the idea was to gain quantity rather than quality through mass arrivals of what polite Australian society still calls the 'New Australian' who are also referred to by the irreverent or downright rude as wops, wogs and poms.        
               
        Although Australia's land mass accounts for a quarter of the entire Asian Pacific region, it contains just over half of one per cent of the population. As in the beginning of mass-migration to Australia, many settlers come from Britain, though these days newcomers from the Asian region are increasingly important. There are large numbers of people of Middle Eastern, Southern European, Central and South American and African origins, adding to the cultural mix. About half of Australia's immigrant population is British by birth, and the next biggest ethnic groups established there are Italian, Greek and Yugoslav.        
               
        More than five-and-a-half (5.5) million immigrants from 120 countries have made their homes in Australia since the Second World War, mostly in the decade or so after it. Intake declined sharply in the early 1950s due to the Cold War and Australia's isolated position as a largely white, Christian outpost in the Asian-Pacific region.        
               
        Confronting racism        
               
        Supporters of what became known as the White Australia Policy displayed all the grudges of other isolated and, therefore, xenophobic societies like racism.        
               
        More reasonable opponents of wholesale migration many trade unionists among them argue that the influx of 'cheap' workers undermine their jobs by accepting low wages and living conditions repellent to 'real dinky-di' Aussies. With nearly 19 million people, mainly coastal city dwellers, they say Australia already has too many people. Overpopulation will lower the quality of life, deplete the stock of natural resources and retard economic growth. Migrants will be housed and then kept by the welfare state, according to the anti-migration lobby of the old school.        
               
        There continues to be vociferous support for this racist White Australia policy. It was, and sometimes still is, supported by many Australians including those who, ironically, were themselves once refugees of poor 'moygrants' from Britain and Europe as well as by 'dinky-dis' afraid of the country being overrun by the 'yellow peril' from overpopulated Asian countries to the north.

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The new multiculturalism        
               
        However, the current policy of encouraging the 'right' kind of settler is based on a fresh profile of the Ideal Migrant. No longer are newcomers encouraged to 'blend in' and become part of a uniform social wallpaper, nor is there the tendency of governments to ignore ethnic interest groups in the hope that they'll assimilate, as in the United States with its 'melting pot' philosophy of ethnicity.        
               
        In Australia, the buzzword is 'multiculturalism' whereby Australia's new citizens are given financial and social incentives to retain the lifestyles, languages and artistic traditions of 'the old country'. Since the White Australia Policy was scrapped in the early 1970s by a new Labour Party national government under Prime Minister Gough Whitlam, the idea of allowing immigrants to nourish a young nation with the best of their respective skills and cultures appears to have been a success. Though some Australians object to multiculturalism, claiming that it leads to communication problems and social divisions, it has been adopted by progressive state and local administrations around the country as the best solution for a country with just over 200 years of modern history and in continuous demand as a tourist and migration destination.        
               
        The New Migrant        

        Australia needs migrants as much as many of them need Australia.        
               
        New Australians are an investment in human capital, and as such are expected to provide good returns over the years.        
               
        In just over a decade immigration policy has been restructured so that each applicant must fall into one of a clear set of categories in order to succeed. The federal government has revised the migration policy with two aims:        
               
        To show the government to be remedying the population shortage by selecting people with skills and money that make them a good investment for Australia and;        
               
        To select newcomers who are unlikely to be a burden on the welfare system.        
               
        In common with most Western nations dependent on domesticconsumption and export revenue to keep the wheels of capitalism turning, Australia continues to suffer from an uncomfortable degree of unemployment and inflation, and migrants are now selected on the probability that they will help to generate jobs and reverse national economic troubles.

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2
Great Expectations        
               
        People have great expectations of life in Australia and can be very badly informed as well. Outsiders often imagine that kangaroos hop down the main streets and that there's a cuddly koala in every tree. In Britain, for example, a monthly newspaper which specialises in preparing would-be migrants and visitors for Australia regularly provides answers to readers' weird and wonderful questions, such as: 'Are there flush toilets in Australia?' 'Is it possible to have a gas stove rather than an electric range?' 'Where can you buy fish 'n' chips?'        
               
        This book won't list the thousands of fish 'n' chip shops Down Under, but it is designed to save you time and money by providing a realistic guide to the lifestyle, history and culture, as well as the ins and outs of a complicated migration policy.        
               
        Understanding Your Motivation        
               
        Immigration experts talk of 'push and pull factors' when they analyse why people like you may be attracted to the idea of changing your lifestyle by going to Australia. A typical push factor for Britons or others from the Northern Hemisphere is eagerness to escape gloomy winters and cold, wet summers. Another important push is lack of economic opportunity in your present environment, due to so many people competing for a small piece of available action. High cost of housing, food, heating, and relatively low wages are strong push factors from the more depressed regions of Britain or Europe.        
               
        Immigrants from warm, relatively cheap places like South-East Asia are also pushed by the overcrowding of their current environment and pulled by the notion of wide open spaces and a more egalitarian society Down Under.        
               
        Pull factors are all the optimistic notions of what you imagine daily life is like in 'ideal' countries like Australia, Canada or the United States. But the whole world has heard of the violence of American cities, and is aware that frozen winters are a feature of life

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in Canada and Northern Europe.        
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        The grass-is-greener-on-the-other-side syndrome is particularly prevalent among people considering Australia.        
               
        Australia has a much lower crime rate than many other urban societies, while the majority of its 18 million people live in relatively warm seaside suburbs.        
               
        Non-Nuclear but Not Always Unpolluted        
               
        One important 'pull' factor encouraging a move to Australia is to minimise the threat of nuclear pollution or nuclear war, obliterating their homes and poisoning the environment, especially in the Northern Hemisphere. Accidents at nuclear plants in Europe and the United States make non-nuclear Australia seem very attractive. Despite being a major source of the world's uranium, other sources of energy are so abundant that there's no need for nuclear power stations, and none are planned. The environmental lobby is vocal but not as politically powerful as in Europe or North America. This has been demonstrated by Australia's recent refusal to support reduction of carbon dioxide emission targets to a uniform level for developed countries. Despite its high emission of greenhouse gases, Australia raised the ire of international environmentalists and caused red faces among Aussie greens by making representations that it should be considered a 'special case'. The government argued that greenhouse targets be tailored to Australia's circumstances as an economy dependent on primary industry and mining.        
               
        As for water pollution and environmental problems, it may come as a shock to anyone considering living there that many of the famous beaches are often closed to swimmers because sewerage and stormwater have been pumped into the oceans for decades. This has become a burning political issue which is more fully explained in Chapter 9 on Playing Down Under.        
               
        Family Reunion        
               
        Another attraction of life in Australia may be that your friends and relatives have moved Down Under already. A family to advise you, help with the application for temporary or permanent residence,

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and ease the transition to a totally different culture, should be a wonderful advantage in terms of your application.        
               
        Since nearly half the people in Australia came as immigrants or are children of immigrants, the government's policy remains somewhat biased towards 'family reunion' on humanitarian grounds. In fact, 'Family' is a specific category for people with relatives in Australia. The urge to join close family members accounts for over half the people who come to live there, under rules which may allow them to join their immediate or extended family.        
               
        Tolerance of Immigrants        
               
        Most migrants have to cope with a degree of disrespect from the mild and usually jocular 'Pommy bashing' of British newcomers, to cracks about 'wogs' from Southern Europe and the Middle East and, most recently, an outbreak of discrimination against people of Oriental Asian appearance.        
               
        Immigrants' experiences        
               
        Chinese-Australian Irene Moss who conducted an inquiry into racist violence for the federal government declared: 'I experienced specific incidents. When I was younger I had people calling me unusual names'. She also tells of walking into a restaurant, causing a woman to walk out complaining of a 'bad smell'. Moss's punchline is not without wry humour: 'That put me off my food!'        
               
        Ms Moss conducted the inquiry into racist violence as Race Discrimination Commissioner of the Human Rights Commission, presiding over discrimination complaints and disputes, and research and educational projects. 'I wonder how you can ever know the extent and cost of indirect racism.' She argued that many people never say openly that they don't want you just because of your race.        
               
        Specific incidents investigated by Ms Moss in the 1990s include systematic attacks on Sydney shop windows, which were smashed and stickers with the word 'Jew' plastered on the walls; a Thai woman who was beaten up in a country town and a Turkish family which found its pet killed and left on the doorstep as a warning.        
               
        Franca Arena, a politician and a leader of Australia's ethnic community, speaks from her own experience about the general problems of coming to live and work in Australia. She arrived in 1959 from Genoa in Italy: 'Moving from one country to another is a great trauma even if you are not a refugee and have a job to go to, relatives to help you, a place to stay and are able to speak the

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language,' she says. 'Australia today is a tolerant, sophisticated society with some of the best back-up facilities for immigrants and minority groups in the world. There is an ethnic affairs commission and equal opportunity employment office set up by the governments of most states. Australia leads the world in ethnic television and radio. Governments are responsible for English classes for adults and children, assessment of overseas qualifications, translation services and general advice for migrants'.        
               
        Emanuel Klein, a Sydney management consultant with extensive government contacts, states that he is something of a 'professional migrant'. Born in Romania, Klein emigrated to Israel, studied for his medical degree in Italy, and settled in Australia with his Australian wife, Wanda, in 1972. 'We have facilities for newcomers like translator and telephone interpreter services simply unheard of elsewhere, even in countries like Israel, which is also a nation of migrants.'        
               
        However, he agrees that there is a degree of discrimination against people for whom English is not the mother tongue. He recalls: 'When I arrived for work at Parliament House in Canberra, where I spent years as an adviser on migration and ethnic affairs, the security guards said I should go to the tradesmen's entrance as soon as they heard my accent. ''The door for domestics is out the back," they told me.'        
               
        Culture Shock        
               
        Like many migrants of British or European origin, Emanuel Klein at first found some aspects of life Down Under very strange indeed.        
               
        'I arrived in Darwin, and was shocked to see all these men in shorts and long socks and I did not know what the hell they were doing dressed like that,' he recalls. The answer, he now knows, is that Aussies dress for comfort whenever they can which is why people at beach suburbs may well go out shopping in their swimsuits.        
               
        Some migrants adopt an 'if you can't beat 'em, join 'em' approach; they don't lie down and take the inevitable culture shock, but do their best to develop a shocking culture. For instance Max Markson, from Bournemouth in England, managed to raise eyebrows even on Sydney's brash social scene with his efforts as a public relations consultant. A local gossip columnist nominated Markson as one of his 'top ten high flyers'. He explained his selection thus: 'Nicknamed Mad Max for his perpetually oddball line in promotions, there is no depth of bad taste that this

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immensely likeable 24 carat hustler has not plumbed to publicise his myriad clients.' For instance, Markson's wet T-shirt contests for women so angered feminists that he ran wet underpants competitions for the blokes. They were a raging success.        
               
        Bill Shipton, from Dorking in Surrey, came to Australia in 1962. He was 23, and a carpenter by trade. Today he is a wealthy man and his very up-market construction company, the Shipton group, specialises in buildings and renovations for clients who can afford to pay several million dollars for a place to hang their (sun)hat.        
               
        'The thing that's different about Australia is they don't put the same emphasis on a business being old and established. So what if it was founded in 1704? Here it doesn't matter if you started up last year, as long as you do a good job.        
               
        'But a lot of English migrants really earn a reputation as "whingeing poms". If you emigrate here, don't think it's going to be easy. You've got to be prepared to work.'        
               
        Shipton agrees that what Australia lacks, compared to his native England, is cultural diversity and choice of places to go to. From his happy position as a millionaire, the solution is simple: 'It only takes a day to fly to London. Then you can spend a month going out to the theatre, if you like.'        
               
        Realistic Expectations        
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        Whatever the hopes and dreams which may persuade you to become a New Australian, the facts show that most can realistically expect a high standard of living.        
               
        Migrants typically live longer, are healthier, more educated and have fewer children than other Australians, according to official government statistics. Of course, this is at least partly because of strict immigration screening processes, health checks and employ-ability applied to anyone wanting to enter as a permanent resident.        
               
        An Australian Bureau of Statistics report entitled Overseas Born Australians says that 50 per cent of the overseas-born had post-school qualifications, compared with 40 per cent of other Australians. Migrant men, on average, can expect to live three to five years longer and migrant women two to three years longer than the Australian-born. Migrant women have an average 2.6 children, compared to an Aussie-born average of almost 3 children each.

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3
Australia The Making of a Nation        
               
        Convict Transportations        
               
        Australia's modern history began with an influx of people who did not want to be there. The first Europeans who came to live and work in Australia were convicts and their guardians. Australia, so alluring nowadays as a place to live and work, was a place for the disposal of the criminal elements of Georgian and Victorian England. Old-fashioned histories politely refer to its first decades as 'colourful'. At first, starvation was a threat when crops failed repeatedly, then the imbalance of convicts to free settlers meant crime was rife and social conditions even rougher than for pioneers of America's wild west. More modern, X-rated versions demonstrate that from 1787 to 1868 the colony was little more than Britain's social sewer. According to the experts, between half and two-thirds of the convict transportees were violent criminals while four out of five were thieves. Australian historian Robert Hughes wrote: 'People used to suppress convict history in the nineteenth century because it was thought to be a disgusting stain and an inherent disgrace on the Australian genes.'        
               
        Even today, some Australians will tell you that they descend from convicts and are proud of it, because their ancestors were freethinkers sent from Mother England as political prisoners. In truth, the first transports of people deported for political reasons did not arrive in Australia until well into the nineteenth century.        
               
        New Frontiers        
               
        Eventually the lower and middle classes back in England got wind that this colony was not such a bad place. Newspaper and personal reports soon spread the word that adventurers as well as convicts who had finished their sentences were doing very nicely, thank you, on their own bits of bush or in fledgling townships. Though distant as the moon, and despite its rough social fabric, the colony gained a

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reputation as a fine place to make a fresh start and even a fortune. In 1851 gold was discovered in Victoria and New South Wales. Some 600,000 immigrants came to try their luck, bringing a blast of prosperity parallel to the gold rushes of North America. An interest in improving the fabric of society resulted in 'anti-transportation' leagues, which sprang up with the aim of persuading Britain to dump its criminals elsewhere. The last convict transport ship arrived in 1868, at Fremantle in Western Australia.        
               
        Meanwhile, the free settlers came with the urge to explore the interior of this vast continent.        
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        This pioneering attitude is still evident among people who take the plunge Down Under today.        
               
        Sinners and Cynics        
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        'Whatever the failings of Canadian, British and American politicans, they never approach the depths of juvenileness regularly plumbed by Australian politicians.'
Conrad Black, Canadian magnate and former proprietor of Australia's Fairfax newspaper empire        
               
        Like international entrepreneur Conrad Black, most Australians aren't impressed by local 'pollies' (politicians) either.        
               
        Twentieth-century Australia retains some of the characteristics of the island jail. People tend to be on the cynical side about those who run their country. As in convict days, people take it for granted that politics and organised crime may go hand in hand.        
               
        Politicians, judges, police chiefs and other figures of authority often have trouble commanding respect and are generally low on the scale of professions in terms of public prestige. Regular revelations about unions, 'pollies', police and magistrates being on the take or otherwise caught with their pants down as former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser was during a self-confessed alcoholic binge in the USA reinforce the impression that life in 'Godzown' country is far from politically, judicially or morally perfect.        
               
        Yet, while cynics suspect that crooked activities emerging publicly are the tip of the iceberg, others say that this proves the sound health of Australia's democracy, and are gratified that such scandals come to light at all.

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Australia's Political System        
               
        At first glance, Australia's political system is a complicated bastard, bewigged and gowned in vestiges of Britain's Westminster system. A closer inspection reveals that the nation has adapted some of the best features of systems for law, order and democracy as evolved by British, North American and Western European societies. In these other places the wheels of justice and politics may clank and grind medieval-style, shackling the present to centuries of history. Australia, on the other hand, has a mere 200 years of Western civilisation to draw on, no traditional 'ruling class', and certain advantages in geographic isolation; so it can afford to be selective about the bits of government it adopts, while free to fit other features to the circumstances. The influence of political convicts from Britain made Australia one of the first countries in the world with universal suffrage and a strong union movement, and Australia remains a most progressive democracy with progressive industrial and anti-discrimination laws.        
               
        Politically, Australia's history began with colonies on the eastern coast at Sydney Harbour, a few miles inland at Parramatta, then settlements established in the north at Brisbane and south at Melbourne, Tasmania and Adelaide. Gradually, the British colony expanded westward and divided into various states which combined in Federation on the first day of the twentieth century 1 January 1901. There is a Prime Minister at federal (national) level, and Premiers heading the cabinet of each state parliament, except for the Northern Territory which has a Chief Minister.        
               
        The Push for a Republic        
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        'If you want your children to have a chance of being Australia's head of state, you could marry Prince Charles or vote for the Australian Republican Movement.'        
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        'Gidday. This Constitutional convention (to decide on the way forward for the proposed Austalian republic) will be wonderful; a fantastic junket. I'll mingle with celebrity windbags and the golf course is nearby. As President of Australian Constitutional Monarchists, I've been intimate with the entire Royal family including the corgis.'        
               
        These extracts from the campaign literature for elections of representatives to Australia's Constitutional Convention in 1998 say it all. While scathing about Australia's historical ties to Britain, many Aussies are also cynical about the real purpose and

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importance of a locally elected President to replace the Queen.        
               
        Under the present constitution, the Monarch of Great Britain and Ireland is also King or Queen of Australia. The monarch's representative at national level is the Governor-General, and each state has its own Governor with ceremonial duties as the monarch's representative.        
               
        Republicanism was not a burning issue until 1975, when a Governor-General decided to quit being an ornament on Australia's political mantlepiece and exert political power. Sir John Kerr exerted the monarch's undemocratic right to dissolve the Federal Parliament against the wishes of the Labour Party Prime Minister, Gough Whitlam. Since then, agitation for the severance of Australia from the monarchy of Mother England has grown. Republicans hope the federal government will take the opportunity of the Federation's 100th birthday to cut the umbilical cord with Britain and declare a republic in 2000. There has been a national competition for a new flag, which would remove the Union Jack from the top left corner. But no such changes have yet come to pass. A strong argument in favour of republicanism is based on the fact that so many Australians have no personal or even cultural ties to Britain due to the vast influx of immigrants from elsewhere after the Second World War; yet over 70 per cent of the population is of British descent while both political leaders and the public appear to enjoy the frequent visits of the British royal family, and Prince Charles has publicly acknowledged the fact that Australia could well be a republic by 2000. The matter is expected to be tested by referendum before 2000.        
               
        So far, the republican element has been gratified mainly by the replacement of 'God Save the Queen' with 'Advance Australia Fair' as the National Anthem. On a legal level, appeals to the Privy Council in London ended after 1983. Now Australia's High Court has the final word within the nation's judicial system.        
               
        Three Tiers of Government        
               
        The federal government        
               
        The federal (or Commonwealth) government is based in Canberra, and like Washington DC, is designed as an administrative centre for the federation of states and territories. The parliament in Canberra has a House of Representatives and a States' house known as the Senate. Members of both the House of Representatives and the Senate are chosen in general elections. Citizens and enfranchised residents over the age of 18 are obliged to keep the wheels of

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democracy turning by casting their votes at general elections held every three years. They are also required to vote for representatives in governments at other levels, as described below.        
               
        State governments        
               
        State governments are the second tier of Australia's democratic system, which may create confusion for newcomers used to one parliament per nation. Because the federal government has responsibility for making decisions on matters affecting the whole country, its elected representatives crop up continually in state affairs. Meanwhile, politicians in the states wrangle with Canberra over financial support via redistribution of federal taxes.        
               
        The Australian constitution gives the federal Parliament through the administrative wing of its public service responsibility for defence, migration, social services, overseas and interstate trade and national economic law as well as powers to legislate on banking, currency, the raising of loans abroad, income tax and other taxation. Much of the taxation revenue is siphoned back to the states, another reason why the politicians in Canberra have influence over education, health care, road building, and funds for the arts at state level.        
               
        Under the Australian constitution, if federal law clashes with that of a state government, federal legislation takes precedence. State governments, each with their own public service, have the constitutional right to make laws on matters not covered by the authorities in Canberra. The states are generally responsible for education, transport links, forests and conservation, water and mineral resources, hospitals, community services, and urban and industrial infrastructure. Though the federal government has a fair grip on the purse strings for such services through its powers to raise income tax, the states finance their activities through other kinds of taxes and loans raised outside the country. Stamp duty and charges on financial transactions and banking are key devices used by state governments to keep themselves in business. The taxation system is discussed in greater detail in Chapter 15.        
               
        The state governments of New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania each have their own constitutions and a parliament comprising two houses a legislative assembly (the lower house) and a legislative council (the upper house), except for Queensland, which has only the lower house, or legislative assembly. The Australian Capital Territory and the Northern Territory have legislative assemblies. By making policies on land, agriculture and the environment within their borders, the

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states find themselves overseeing the establishment of new industry and business, and therefore wielding some influence on questions of immigration. State and territory governments advise Canberra of shortages in particular skills or professions, and the viability of proposed investments or businesses by foreigners or would-be immigrants.        
               
        Local government        
               
        This is the third tier of government in Australia. Shire, municipal or city councils run Australia's urban and rural regions. These are responsible for town planning, sewerage, garbage collection, maintaining roads, bridges and similar matters as well as local facilities such as public libraries. Local governments finance their activities through land and water rates or similar charges on households and businesses in their areas. Local councils are partly dependent on funding from the states.        
               
        The Economy: Still the Lucky Country?        
               
        Swimming with the tide of international prosperity, the Australian economy has recently swung between rude health and the fear of a bust. Despite some ups and downs over the past decade, the economy hit a low point with a fresh blowout in the cost of imports compared to exports, a drop in the value of the Australian dollar and general jitters due to financial difficulties for the Asian region as a whole in the late 1990s. Australians cannot forget their predicament of the mid-1980s when the Australian dollar collapsed along with export earnings and Aussies realised that they could no longer assume that theirs was 'the lucky country'.        
               
        However, Australia remains quite sound compared to so many of its trade partners and competitors. Inflation has been hovering at 3 per cent in recent years and unemployment at about 8 per cent. Government forecasts put economic growth at 4 per cent. The World Bank estimates that Australia's vast natural resources make it one of the wealthiest nation on earth. But Australia's top ranking in terms of 'natural capital' (including arable land, minerals, machinery, infrastructure and educated labour) contrasts with its relatively low standing in terms of national income, where Australia typically ranks at about number 20.        
               
        In the words of one financial analyst, domestic inflation and a growing foreign debt could still catch up with the swimmer before he reaches the beach. Nevertheless, the economic outlook has improved mainly due to rationalisations in the business community.

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There has also been a strong desire by small and medium-sized companies to exploit regional and other export markets. The services and high tech sectors have done especially well through the recession of the mid-1990s and leaner Aussie businesses generally are now adding to the optimism that recovery can be sustained. Encouraged by state and the federal governments, Australians are also cashing in on the tourist boom. Australia now caters for over 2 million overseas tourists a year, compared to 563,000 in 1977. The 2000 Olympics to be held in Sydney is another business opportunity that is likely to have a positive impact nationally, with 6 million visitors expected in that year.        
               
        Cost of Living        
               
        Despite international awareness of its economic ups and downs, Australia has no trouble raising and filling migration quotas. Judging from an enquiry rate of over a million each year, many outsiders believe they still have a better chance of 'having a fair go' Down Under than elsewhere.        
               
        The relative weakness of its currency and eagerness to attract people with skills or talents to help build the economy is good news if you are thinking about spending time and money in Australia, and may help you meet the financial criteria to make the move.        
               
        This means many immigrants who sell up homes, cars or other assets considered modest in their country of origin may increase their spending power by moving to Australia.        
               
        However, a recent survey by a London-based advisory agency, Employment Conditions Abroad, found Australia to be more expensive for food and petrol than the UK. In $A terms, research suggests it costs $A459 a week to maintain an acceptable standard of living for a family of four. Some $A145 a week was the average required for food bills, or over 30 per cent of overall living costs, up 2 per cent on findings for the previous year. This is daunting, when you consider that, in 199798, nearly 50% of Australians had a weekly income of $300 a week or less. Only 5 per cent of the population earned more than $1000 a week.        
               
        Employment        
               
        Despite the recession and dire warnings by political leaders and major employers, attitudes of the locals to work and play have not changed dramatically. Working hours continue to fall, wages keep pace with inflation and industrial law is considered among the

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world's most progressive in protecting non-union employees as well as professionals from unfair dismissal. The still powerful trade union movement fights the case for regular wage indexation in negotiations with governments and before industrial tribunals, with undertakings on productivity increases being exchanged for financial rewards on superannuation.        
               
        Unemployment is about 8 per cent. Most of Australia's long-term jobless are under 25 or people close to retirement age who have been made redundant or otherwise ejected from the workforce because they have no suitable skills. As described in Chapter 11, the federal government pays unemployment benefits and many categories of permanent residents are entitled to claim these. However, the policy of sifting applications from outsiders who want to live and work in Australia aims to avoid giving approval to newcomers likely to join the ranks of the jobless.        
               
        Unfortunately, statistics indicate that the risks of an immigrant being out of work in Australia are greater now than 20 years ago.        
               
        In line with the long-term trend, people born outside Australia have a higher than average rate of unemployment, at just over 10 per cent, according to figures collated by the Australian Bureau of Statistics. The greatest problem on the job market is for new Australians from non-English speaking backgrounds. In fact, people from English-speaking countries seem to have less problem finding and keeping jobs than the average Australian, whereas unemployment is experienced by a quarter to a third of people (often refugees or relatively impoverished compared to European immigrants) from the Middle East and Africa, Vietnam or Lebanon.

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4
Attitudes Down Under        
               
        Down Under, people have a way of looking at life which may not be easy for outsiders to comprehend. If, however, you plan to live and work in Australia, it is essential to know about a unique set of prejudices, stereotypes and social responses which affect the way locals see immigrant newcomers as well as each other.        
               
        Lack of Pretensions        
               
        One of the most refreshing things about Australians is their lack of pretensions. Lord Bradford, an English aristocrat, tells the story of his time travelling around the country. Having been introduced as Earl Bradford, locals would naturally greet him with a cheery 'G'day, Earl!'        
               
        This is a nation where Prime Ministers appear on television news drawling, 'Owya going mate?' and everyone seems to be on first name terms. If you can't remember someone's first name, 'mate' will usually suffice even if talking to a woman.        
               
        Australians adopt a casual, drop-in approach when socialising and working, none of this filofax-at-the-ready stuff, or effusive apologies at inconvenience which might be caused by a last-minute meeting.        
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        If it does not suit, the typical Australian will tell you straight no bull, as they put it.        
               
        Class and Money        
               
        In Australia it is usual to sit in the passenger seat and chat to the taxi driver, a refreshing contrast to countries where a cabbie confronted with this behaviour might radio his base and report that he'd just picked up a weirdo. Like the script of Home and Away, the now famous soap opera, society is relatively classless. There's little

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preoccupation with family history, royal titles or old school ties.        
               
        In fact, the authors of a Down Under edition of Debrett's a publication which previously confined itself to the peers and titled classes of Britain have been forced to play an entirely new ball game. Knights and Dames are thin on the ground in Australia, especially since state and federal Labour governments no longer nominate local luminaries for honours conferred by the Queen. As a local magazine columnist put it, the only thing that's hereditary among Aussie notables is a tendency to baldness and Debrett's is reduced to listing the spectacularly rich.        
               
        Few Australians consider 'old' money superior to new. New wealth will do fine, thank you, and no one gives a hoot if a bloke keeps his tinnies in the bath. What everyone really wants to know is: How many yachts do you own? Are there fax machines as well as telephones in your cars? Was a mountainside of marble imported to build your bathroom? In other words, money buys class and if you've enough of it, most doors will eventually swing open.        
               
        But not all doors. To say that class consciousness does not exist at all Down Under is misleading. For example, rural Victoria's frightfully Anglicised 'squatocracy', as well as the more snooty residents of Sydney's North Shore and Eastern Suburbs, have similar social aspirations to their predominantly British ancestors. From Perth's Peppermint Grove to the rural estates of Warnambool in Victoria, from conservative boardrooms in Sydney to millionaire pensioners in Melbourne's South Yarra and in plenty of less well-heeled enclaves too there are those who value the 'right' schools, charity balls and clubs. Catholics, Jews, Blacks and Asians find it hard to get a foot in some doors, unless it's the tradesmen's entrance.        
               
        Discrimination and the Law        
               
        From a legal standpoint, Australia is an enlightened society, well-equipped to prevent and punish infringements of human rights on the basis of race, gender, sexual preference, marital status, colour, nationality or background. Legislation at both state and national levels enforces this official attitude in Australian society.        
               
        However, if you have the idea that governments are always in tune with the non-discriminatory, non-sexist, non-sectarian aspirations and jargon, think again.        
               
        Homosexuals and Discrimination        
               
        Tasmania is the last state in Australia to maintain laws against sex

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between consenting male adults. In Victoria sex between male adults was decriminalised in 1980, and in New South Wales home of the world-famous Sydney gay and lesbian Mardi Gras decriminalisation came as late as 1984. At a federal level, Australia is signatory to international anti-discrimination codes, which overrule state law.        
               
        Women and Discrimination        
               
        It is illegal to offer women different rates of pay for doing the same job as a man, yet female workers still average about 20 per cent lower pay. Although they often run their own businesses and are embarking on careers which were until recently all-male bastions, women are almost non-existent among the directors of major companies. When the management of Australia's largest companies were asked if there were any women on its board, the unofficial answer was, 'God, no'.        
               
        When asked how many women were on its board, the head office of a major telephone company enquired, 'Do you mean the switchboard?'        
               
        Federal government policy is that 25 per cent of all representatives on government boards and authorities should be women, rising to 50 per cent in the longer term. However, the truth is that less than 13 per cent of board members appointed to government authorities and organisations are female.        
               
        By the end of the mid-1990s real gains had been made in paid maternity leave and among the most leading edge financial sector companies even paternity leave. There is also legislation in place protecting women's rights to return to permanent employment after maternity leave. Generally, after twelve months' continuous employment, a woman can expect twelve months' unpaid maternity leave and to return to a position at the same level of remuneration.        
               
        In terms of women coming to prominence in traditionally male dominated spheres, the move to appoint Dame Mary Gaudron to the High Court in 1987 the first woman was a milestone. In the decade that followed women have been state premiers, leaders of political parties, national union leaders, head of the National Farmers Federation as well as becoming wharfies on Sydney's docks.        
               
        Migrants and Discrimination        
               
        Migrants of non-English speaking backgrounds often have to work twice as hard to achieve half as much.        
               
        Ken Edwards, a Queensland journalist whose articles on