Living & Working in Australia

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migration won the Media Peace Prize awarded by the United Nations, demonstrates the contradictory attitudes of the Australians with an anecdote about the old-timer who bemoans the supposed takeover by Italians. 'I can't abide 'em. Don't trust 'em,' he complains then stops to say 'G'day' to a shopkeeper with an Italian accent. 'Nice little bloke,' he says, walking on.        
               
        In the major cities there are many migrant and interpreter services available, as well as a staggering variety of ethnic social clubs, restaurants, sporting groups and other means of making contact with those of a similar origin. There's even a kind of snobbery in reverse people with 'natural suntans', foreign accents or backgrounds deemed 'exotic' attract the curious admiration of the indigenous White Anglo Saxon Protestant (WASP) majority.        
               
        Emanuel Klein, who could not speak a word of English when he arrived in 1972 and became prominent in government and business as an ethnic community commentator tells of the friendliness and sincerity of the locals. 'People I'd met once or twice invited me to dinner. What's more, Aussies actually meant it when they said, ''We must get together some time", unlike in Europe where this would be a mere politeness, with no genuine invitation intended.'        
               
        However, to presume that people who do not fit the WASP profile are sure to be welcomed with open arms everywhere they go is, unfortunately, a fantasy. A glance at the section in this book on Aussie slang demonstrates that there are many unflattering terms for people of an ethnic background. The label 'New Australian' is not always kind. It may imply all manner of shortcomings. There are other terms for the 'wogs' far too derogatory to reproduce here expressions which it is hoped you will never hear as a foreign visitor or immigrant.        
               
        Racism        
               
        The influx of Oriental migrants in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s has led to a backlash of protests and many documented cases of discrimination and even violence. One step on from the White Australia Policy supporters who, in previous decades, feared the continent was in danger of being overrun by the 'yellow peril' to its north, the anti-Asian lobby of today predicts continued migration will aggravate political and social problems. However, the government in Canberra maintains that its migration policy will continue to let in people who meet their criteria, irrespective of colour, sex or religion.        
               
        However, Australia's reputation as a relatively progressive

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democracy which welcomes people of all backgrounds was badly tarnished in 1997 when a Queensland federal MP, Pauline Hanson, echoed the sentiments of the White Australian days with her criticism of migrant and aboriginal groups. Hanson has been lumbered with the blame for making Australia a racially divided country and discouraging Asian business investment. Though her views are narrow, socially divisive and not at all original in Australian society, much of the blame for Hanson's success and the prominence of her One Nation party is due to the tardiness of the ruling Liberal party and its leaders to repudiate her pronouncements. In the meantime, Hanson has become a household name in Australia and notorious among Asia's business communities with an interest in Australia, due to her contentious, racially-biased views.        
               
        Franca Arena has lived in Australia for 30 years. She is an outspoken and controversial prominent politician with wide expertise in the special problems of migrant communities. Arena says, 'The most recent ethnic group to arrive usually bears the brunt of prejudice. For instance, when I arrived with an influx of southern Europeans, ours was the group that suffered most. Today it is the Asian community. But on the whole, Australians are now more reasonable, more likely to admit everyone is entitled to a "fair go" and that it's a big country with room for all kinds. In my experience, racial problems and intolerance are far worse in the more overpopulated nations.'        
               
        As for Pauline Hanson's views on the problems of Asian migration and the local aboriginal community, these policies are actually more moderate than those of many right-wing parties in Western Europe.        
               
        Multiculturalism        
               
        Governments try to make the most of a diverse immigrant population with a policy of 'multiculturalism'. Though the Asian community has been the focus of debate since the mid-1970s, they comprise only about 5 per cent of the total population. More than 75 per cent of Australians are of British or Irish origin, and 20 per cent were born in other European countries or are of European ancestry.        
               
        Multiculturalism is the conviction that new blood brings with it many social, cultural and economic advantages. It means that foreigners who join Australian society are not required to assimilate in fact, they are encouraged to be different and maintain traditions and languages. Australia's publicly funded ethnic radio and television stations broadcast in 57 languages and are even selling subtitled

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foreign language programmes abroad. Government schools, colleges and universities all place emphasis on teaching community languages and offer a bewildering range of linguistic and cultural studies.        
               
        In Australian cities and larger towns, newspaper stands groan under the weight of 'ethnic' publications published at home or imported. Large, established and influential ethnic groups, such as the Italian, Greek, Lebanese, Asian and Eastern European communities, have a number of publications catering to subcultures within their communities, as well as their own social clubs, art galleries and museums, schools, churches and sporting organisations. However, reassessments of the multicultural policy have led to studies which show that many Australians remain ambivalent to the 'wogs' in their midst, claiming multiculturalism has touched their lives merely by providing a better range of restaurants.        
               
        As for the newcomers, they are often shell-shocked by the apparently informal, easy-going, even 'loose' lifestyles of the 'dinky-dis' down the road. The real differences may not be obvious for years, emerging eventually when their children adopt local manners and values. Immigrants from places with strict social or religious codes often suffer in this clash between old ways and new. Children from non-Australian backgrounds grow up to speak with Aussie accents, take to surfing, pub-going, disco-ing and other social or sporting customs considered normal for Australians but alien to their parents. A Vietnamese community leader, editor of a Vietnamese daily newspaper at Cabramatta, Sydney's suburban Saigon, summed up the problems this way: 'There are some young people with multi-coloured hair, and we don't like that. In Vietnam my children never came close to me, but here they tap me on the shoulder and say, "Hello Dad". Sometimes this goes to extremes. I once heard a boy say to his father, "Hello, mate"!'        
               
        Australians and Travel        
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        Heaven is an English policeman, a French cook, a German engineer, an Italian lover and everything organised by the Swiss.
Hell is an English cook, a French engineer, a German policeman, a Swiss lover and everything organised by the Italians.
(Aussie entrepreneur, John Elliot)        
               
        Just a couple of decades ago, an Australian who had seen the world was an exception. Good reasons like distance, the comforts of home, plus perhaps a fear of tackling foreigners and their languages on alien

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turf kept Australians to Australia. However, improved communications and an ever more cosmopolitan culture have assisted Aussies in lifting their sunglasses to take a look at life beyond Bondi Beach. As a result, you'll often meet Aussies who have been to Alabama, Amsterdam and the Algarve but not Ayers Rock.        
               
        Foreign travel is an obsession for many young Aussies, keen adventurers who backpack to the most unlikely places. A grand tour 'OS' (as Australians call 'overseas') is a kind of finishing school an extension of the educational process for young middle class Australians. Yet when you encounter them quaffing beer in the London pubs or haggling for souvenirs in the bazaars of the Orient, most express supreme enthusiasm for Australia in comparison to almost any place they've seen.        
               
        Back in Australia, on radio chat shows or as taxi drivers, many Aussies will concur that 'Godzown's' is the best country in the world with top weather/beer/fashion/food/blokes...        
               
        Blokes        
               
        When it comes to Ocker stereotypes, there are two breeds of bloke. One is naive and Neanderthal great for a beer and a laugh. The other embodies the toughness of the adventurer a businessbloke who conceals the dorsal fin of a shark beneath his grey suit, but who may also take time out during his hectic week to read up on how to be a better father to his son, attend a Men's Health Seminar (annual events on a national scale in Australia) or join the neighbourhood men's counselling group.        
               
        The male stereotypes of Australia arise from national pride in a tough pioneering heritage: Europeans conquering an inhospitable environment, macho guys hacking their way through the bush, stockmen home on the range in the outback. That handsome, tall-in-the-saddle image stems from the anti-establishment attitude of convicts and outcast radicals from the 'old world'. Cowboys and helmeted bushranger heroes like Ned Kelly may not have been gentlemen, but they forded rivers, trekked vast deserts and often died exploring the mysteries of the island continent. Every schoolchild is taught to be proud of these aspects of Australia's eighteenth- and nineteenth-century colonial history, as well as the more recent 'legend' of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps the ANZAC volunteers needlessly expended in a spectacularly disastrous campaign against the Turks at Gallipoli in the First World War.        
               
        Now consider that other vision of Aussie blokehood the sensitive but tough businessman. The ubiquitous publisher,

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Rupert Murdoch, swapped Australian citizenship for an American passport for reasons of business rather than patriotism and remains 'dinky-di' in his ruthless, no-nonsense dealings with other companies and his own employees. His eldest son, Lachlan, is now running the local news empire. James Packer, son of another colourful media magnate and world class gambler, Kerry, is another new generation Aussie man who other blokes may privately scorn for being a rich businessman's son. But James, like Lachlan, is the darling of the social pages and embodies many of the contradictory qualities of sporting, beefy, cultured yet canny Aussie blokedom of the future.        
               
        Crocodile Dundee star Paul Hogan continues to be a local hero. Paul specialises in playing himself. 'Hoges', as he is known, is a role model Down Under and famous worldwide as the thoroughly modern ocker of the cinema screen. He is famous for advertising his country's beer and tourist attractions. As Mike 'Crocodile' Dundee in the highly successful movies of the same name, Hogan played the naive conman. Australians identify with Hogan because he is handsome, outdoorsy, sociable, beer-drinking, rich and famous; a self-made man and a nice bloke too.        
               
        As in most cultures, men tend to get together to relax. This means drinking en masse in pubs, going to the footy, and letting it all hang out (beer guts too) away from the prying eyes of women and children.        
               
        While it is wrong to assume that stereotypes are the rule or that polarisation of the sexes is uniquely Australian, anyone who has stayed awhile in the outback community would soon get a picture of the more extreme characteristics. When not utterly charming, funny and sensible, both blokehood and sheiladom can be boozy, racist, anti-homosexual, violent and ugly.        
               
        Sheilas        
               
        The typical Australian party is said to segregate blokes at one side of a room around the beer keg, and sheilas (also known as 'The Girls') at the other. Once again, putting too much faith in a stereotype can be a mistake. A typical suburban get-together Down Under can in fact be a sun-drenched, appetising and hugely sociable experience for everyone; but once again there is more than a grain of truth in the assumption that, like the blokes, sheilas are tough. Australian women do tend to self-reliance. According to this stereotype, a suggestion by the man of the house to his 'liddle lydee' along the lines of, 'Ya don' mind chopping some wood for the barbie, do ya darls?' or the knowledge that he's in the boozer with the boys again is part of the routine.

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Like her masculine counterpart, the typical Sheila is not always a pretty sight. The parrakeet screech of Barry Humphries' creation, Dame Edna Everage, is one of the least flattering caricatures of Aussie womanhood. Humphries' 'Frankenstein' that jumped-up housewife whose late hubby Norm surely thanked his lucky stars that a malfunctioning prostate gland kept him in hospital and out of the clutches of the blue-rinsed, rhinestone-encrusted harridan rings true for some sectors of suburban life Down Under; but real sheilas and their admirers are waiting for the emergence of an intelligent, sexy female stereotype to do for female egos what Paul Hogan has done for the blokes.        
               
        Despite the growth of two-job families, studies showed that working wives in Australia spent about 33 hours a week more than their partners on household chores. Yet another survey showed 93 per cent of Australian women believed men should share all the housework. The pressure is on.        
               
        In the 1990s most young women said they needed both a paying job and a family of their own to feel fulfilled. They want sensitive sons (who share housework) and ambitious daughters (who see themselves as social and intellectual equals to their brothers).        
               
        The Modern Australian Woman        
               
        Though Australian women lag behind men in terms of average pay and status at work, the past few years have seen them gaining a grip on formerly masculine bastions like the law, business and politics.        
               
        International feminism is indebted to Germaine Greer and

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compatriots while the women's movement has always been well advanced in Australia. It was the second country in the world (after New Zealand) to give women the right to vote, in 1901. However, women did not gain the right to stand for parliament until some 20 years later. These days, Australian state and federal parliaments have one of the highest ratios of female members in the world. About one in ten MPs is a woman, a ratio higher only in the Scandinavian countries.        
               
        In business, the arts and media, women are relatively well entrenched. As in Europe and America, women make the most of 'networking', to help themselves to better positions in a male-chauvinist society. They are entering non-traditional trades and professions and the argument is less often heard that women should stay home in these days of high unemployment to give the blokes a 'fairer go'.        
               
        'Yoof'        
               
        Australia's urban teenagers are among the most worldly-wise on the planet when it comes to shopping and sex education. A survey in 1997 showed the kids are also well educated, widely informed, multicultural, self-reliant and technologically aware. Nearly 70 per cent finish high school but their biggest problem is unemployment, which in Australia strikes 15-to-19-year olds at the rate of around 30 per cent. Coping with change makes them value self-reliance, says the survey, and 'being in control' was nominated almost as important in measuring success as 'satisfaction with life and marriage'. According to the report, compiled from government, youth programme and advertising statistics, Australia's 12-to-18-year olds earn an average of $37 a week (mainly from weekend jobs), smoke Winfield, wear Nike, drink Gatorade and listen to Sony.        
               
        Gays        
               
        No discussion of Australian stereotypes would be complete without the role of male and female homosexuals (gays and lesbians) in society. In bigger cities many have come out to enjoy a free lifestyle. In smaller towns, rural areas and certain states, however, attitudes can be virulently homophobic and if you are gay, it does not pay to advertise the fact.        
               
        On the whole, the 1990s have seen accelerated acceptance of non-heterosexual lifestyles. The federal government enacted equal rights laws making discrimination on grounds of a person's sexual

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preferences illegal. A former premier of South Australia, Don Dunstan, actually told a television interviewer he was bisexual. Meanwhile, a 1994 government study recommended that gay couples be eligible to adopt children.        
               
        The gay community has pushed for full recognition of the non-Australian partner in a gay couple as a 'spouse' for purposes of immigration and residency applications. After 1983, the federal government modified its rulings to give consideration on compassionate or humanitarian grounds under the immigration points system. However, the association of homosexuals with AIDS means the gay community has adopted a lower political profile, especially since the screening of migration applicants for the disease has been implemented.        
               
        The eastern capital cities Melbourne, Adelaide and especially Sydney have thriving gay communities. Sydney has a reputation for its vibrant scene in the Oxford Street area, which has a gay population almost as high per capita as San Francisco's. The Mardi Gras in Sydney each February is the biggest gay street festival in the world, drawing over half a million people and boosting local and international tourism. Yet the majority of the sightseers and television audience for the Mardi Gras is from the local 'straight' community.        
               
        Although only a minority of gays and lesbians find it possible to be quite open, the world of blokes and sheilas would not be the same without them. In the big cities and towns, homosexuals open or otherwise make a unique contribution to arts, literature, academic life and entertainment in general.        
               
        While church leaders and social conservatives regularly denounce them, and agitate for legislation to push gays back into the closet, male and female homosexuals of the bigger cities have their own well-publicised telephone counselling services as well as churches, pubs, clubs, performing arts groups, even travel agencies to take them to regional resorts that specialise in the lucrative gay market.        
               
        Yet there remains a strong lobby that aims to show the danger of accepting homosexuality, championed by moral and religious organisations such as the Festival of Light. The suburban and rural Australia of Bruce and Brucelene is no place for gays. In 1997, the strong media focus on paedophilia was used to cast aspersions on the gay community by 'outing' prominent public figures and their families. Homosexuals are occasionally attacked by gangs of marauding 'poofter-bashers' and a study showed that some murders of gay and lesbian people were motiviated by homophobia.

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Aboriginals        
               
        The ugliest incidents of racism in Australia are committed against the aboriginal minority. According to the Human Rights Commission, 30 to 40 per cent of our complaints are lodged by aboriginal people. Those complaints usually concern the refusal of basic services in shops, pubs, restaurants and accommodation because of the colour of a person's skin.        
               
        Despite continuing discrimination, the activities of aboriginal rights activists continue to focus on whether native title (land rights) should take precedence over valuable mining and pastoral leases. By late 1997 the legal rights of aboriginals to 'their' land had become a burning political issue, following a series of High Court challenges and failure of parliament to resolve the debate by passing the Wik Legislation. Apart from issues like native title, and the fact that aboriginals are imprisoned at a rate fourteen times higher than for other Australians, it is possible to forget that Australia's genuine 'first settlers' are there at all. Even more than other ethnic groups, aboriginals stick together in city slums or isolated in outback communities. Today the aboriginal population numbers 300,000, including half-castes, though some say the real figure is more like half a million.        
               
        It is only since 1971 that the general census has included the native population in its survey of Australians and their living standards. A couple of years before that, Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders were granted full citizenship rights, including the right to vote. Not surprisingly, Australia has been labelled the 'South Africa' of the Pacific. Supporters of this point of view describe white Australians as passive racists, only saved from being cast into the apartheid camp by the fact that the majority of the population is white.        
               
        Respectable white society is embarrassed at the ill-treatment of the black minority by the police and other whites. Yet it is not unusual to hear such discrimination condoned even by otherwise worldly, well-educated members of migrant minority groups who have, ironically, been victims of discrimination themselves. Their 'conventional' wisdom is that the Abos are a drunken, lazy, useless lot quite beyond help and redemption.        
               
        At last an effort is being made to apply multiculturalism to aboriginals, too with positive results. Aboriginal culture has become popular fashion. Many white Australians wear aboriginal motif T-shirts, hang aboriginal wall paintings (at least in poster form) in homes and offices.

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今天再贴十页。 个人感觉文章的文字还是比较流畅的。

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The Dreamtime        
               
        Aboriginal culture is based on the Dreamtime philosophy, giving spiritual focus to the land and with a concept of time fusing past, present and future. The peoples now known as Australian Aboriginals and Torres Strait Islanders crossed from South-East Asia more than 60,000 years ago. No one knows what the population was when the European invasion began in 1788, though it has been estimated that aboriginals numbered at least 250,000.        
               
        Oppression of Aboriginals        
               
        From the time of the first arrivals from Britain 200 years ago, newcomers took it upon themselves to wipe out or suppress indigenous black tribes and their 'inferior' culture.        
               
        In Tasmania, the situation was so bad that aboriginals were massacred to the point of extinction. Apart from slaughtering the blacks like wild animals and exploiting them mercilessly, the whites infected them with hitherto unknown diseases and introduced the natives to the corrupting influence of alcohol. By the beginning of the twentieth century, aboriginal and especially half-caste children were exiled from their communities and trained as slave labourers and servants for middle class whites.        
               
        Today the condition of many 'Abos' in country areas, shanty towns and urban ghettos is often pathetic, presenting an unpleasant example of progress-gone-haywire. Many aborigines live on income from land royalties, mining leases or government welfare payments. These payments often assuage the guilty consciences of White Australian taxpayers, who indirectly provide some 70 per cent of this minority group's total income. In a landmark High Court decision known as the Mabo case, effective ownership of some ten per cent of Australia's land mass has been returned to the natives, and, despite continuing debate and legal challenges to clarify the Aboriginals' claims, many tribes are paid royalties in return for the use of their land. Ayers Rock, or Uluru, the huge red boulder which is a major tourist attraction in the desert of the Northern Territory, is the most famous of the sites returned to the Aboriginals in the mid-1980s by a progressive Labour administration in Canberra, after decades of political pressure. As a result, visits to the sacred rock are on a 'look but don't touch' basis, and tourists will no longer be allowed to scramble all over it. Yet the notion of owning land is at odds with Aboriginal lore. Their idea is that people belong to the land, not the other way around.

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Government efforts to support Aboriginals' rights often lead to accusations of tokenism and corruption. There are presently only a handful of blacks holding high political or bureaucratic positions.        
               
        Nevertheless, in Western Australia Ernie Bridge became the first of his race to be appointed as a Cabinet Minister by the State Government in 1986, while Pat O'Shane, an aboriginal woman, became a NSW magistrate in the same year. Despite their critics, Aboriginals are politically motivated as never before, learning to play the system with or without the help of whites who sometimes backed their political campaigns. The plight of the native Australians is reflected in recent figures showing that they are more than ten times more likely than other Australians to have served a prison sentence some 726.5 per 100,000 compared to 60 of every 100,000 whites. Aboriginal rights activists claim that this is proof of widespread police harassment, exemplified by a Queensland case in which an Aboriginal was jailed for three months for stealing two loaves of bread. On the other hand, the Court of Criminal Appeal has noted a tendency for judges to treat aboriginals more leniently than other offenders.        
               
        Aboriginals are also beset with health problems. Alcohol abuse drags down many members of the older generation while petrol sniffing is a common pastime for youngsters. Infant mortality and disease is rife compared to other social groups while the average life expectancy for an Aboriginal is around 52 years, some 20 years less than the national average. Although unemployment is about three times that of whites, officials say that there are few complaints from Aboriginals who cannot get a job because of the colour of their skin.        
               
        Aboriginals are still fighting to obtain the basic rights service without discrimination, a house to live in, water to bathe in and so on. In many cases, discrimination in employment is the least of their worries.

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5
Australia How Will You Get In?        
               
        Many people misunderstand the Australian rules and regulations which govern permanent and temporary migration.        
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        The assumption is that the rules exist to keep people out. The truth, however, is that in the past few years these rules have been reviewed and changed to encourage more of the 'right' people to come in.        
               
        This chapter aims to explain how Australia's system of categories, concessions and accumulation of 'points' can work for you, to maximise the chance of success for your own application. What's more, the price you pay for this book will be far less than the time, trouble and money needed to prepare and lodge an application. It would be a pity to be rejected, with no refund for fees paid, simply because you hadn't done your homework first using our guide to Australia's migration rules.        
               
        Policy and Politics        
               
        The federal government, which is responsible for migration policy and must approve every application, regularly reviews the laws on immigration, in line with its political and economic concerns. With each change, the aim is to select more skilled workers and the kind of people most likely to contribute to Australia's economic growth. The aim also is to be more open to people likely to make a good life there, for the benefit of both the newcomer and the nation as a whole. To be successful your application for a stay in Australia should fall into one of the following categories:        
               
        A holiday visit. No intention of working just a trip abroad, though perhaps with an eye open for business, work, educational or lifestyle opportunities if and when you return again.

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A working holiday. A temporary stay presents a chance to gain work experience, live in a fresh environment, make money for holidaying in Australia and on your way to and from there.        
               
        Educational purposes. Australia's educational institutions may provide equivalent or better opportunities for study than other places, while you'll also have the excitement and experience of living in a new environment.        
               
        Temporary residency. Your plan might be to take a short-term job in your field of expertise, sponsored by an Australian company or educational institution, or posted there by a foreign company.        
               
        Permanent residency. This is a long-term commitment to the ideal of living and working in Australia. You may have friends or family you want to join, you may want to live in a sunny, relatively free, untroubled society and on this basis decide that Australia best meets your personal needs while being a place where your family and career can flourish.        
               
        Australia's entry rules also make it possible for people to become permanent residents on humanitarian grounds, as refugees from a regime or government which presents a serious threat to their welfare.        
               
        Illegal Immigrants        
               
        Overriding the rules and regulations is the law in Australia on illegal immigrants and people working without permits. Since many more people want to live there than Australia can accommodate, rules regarding people who overstay their visas, or who are found to be working in contravention of the terms of their (e.g. visitor) visas, are tough. In 1997 it was estimated some 45,000 people were in Australia illegally. In 199697 over 5,600 people were deported as illegal entrants or unlawful non-citizens. Illegal workers are thought to cost many jobs and millions of dollars a year in government unemployment benefits to jobless residents, making this an emotive political issue.        
               
        Such people face either virtual 'imprisonment' in the country, since they would probably be detected if they tried to leave, or deportation, a heavy fine or a prison sentence if they are discovered. Overstayers are excluded from returning to Australia for up to three years, whether or not they leave voluntarily.

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Visitors who inadvertently overstay their visas should contact the nearest immigration office to sort out the problem.        
               
        Visitor Visa and Migration Procedure        
               
        If you are thinking of going to Australia as a tourist, temporary resident or permanent settler, your application must be made from outside the country except under special circumstances (see Special Assistance Category later in this chapter). By 2000 it is expected that over 7 million visas will be issued by Australia each year so no wonder such a range of rules and fees apply.        
               
        The Cost of Visas and Migration Applications        
               
        The list of migration fees is long, and in the case of applications for certain categories of permanent residency a charge is levied for each family member on the application form. If you are outside Australia, the fees are payable in the currency of a foreign country equivalent to the amount of Australian dollars being charged for the visa. Not all fees listed below are for applications made prior to going to Australia, but in some circumstances they will be relevant for visitors or settlers after arrival.        
               
        These charges alter with time but, as a rough guide, here are some of the costs that may apply to your application:        
               
        Application Fees        
               
        Tourist visa valid 3 months to over one year        
       
               
        $A35$A145        
               
        Temporary Business Entry        
       
               
        $A145        
               
        Temporary Residence        
       
               
        $A145        
               
        Tempory Residence prospective marriage partner        
       
               
        $A1055        
               
        Student Visa Application        
       
               
        $A280        
               
        Sponsorship for entry to Australia for temporary residents        
       
               
        $A210        
               
        Migration to Australia on lodgement (except Business Skills)        
       
               
        $A1565        
               
        Business Skills Application (on lodgement)        
       
               
        $A2540        
               
        Resident return visa (lodged in Australia)        
       
               
        $A65        
               
        Resident return visa (lodged overseas)        
       
               
        $A80        
               
        Evidence of resident status        
       
               
        $A55$A65        
               
        Registration of Australian citizenship by descent        
       
               
        $A110        
               
        Grant of Australian citizenship        
       
               
        NIL$A120        
               
        Declaratory Certificate of Australian citizenship        
       
               
        $A55

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Resumption of Australian citizenship        
       
               
        $A65        
               
        Appeals against certain Migration Act decisions (depending on nature of review)        
       
               
        $A240$A1000        

               
        No 'Freebies' for Would-be Migrants        
               
        If you are serious about applying to become a permanent settler in Australia, you must pay a fee to the Department of Immigration and Multicultural Affairs when you lodge the application. There are also charges for sponsors and for English education, where relevant, which are detailed later in this chapter. Documentary evidence such as certified copies of birth and marriage certificates are other expenses you may have to carry, while in some cases your employment or educational qualifications will also need to be assessed in return for a fee (see the fee list in Chapter 6). It all adds up to an expensive exercise, and all the money is lost if your application fails because there are no refunds.        
               
        You will not normally have access to counselling by Australia's migration or visa officials when you apply. Unless you plan the application carefully, it could be rejected and you would have wasted money paid in fees, which are not refundable.        
               
        Health and Character Checks        
               
        Everyone who applies for a visitor visa, to work temporarily or to settle in Australia permanently, is subject to health and character checks. An applicant and his or her dependants planning to enter under the same visa must undergo medical examinations to prove that they are in sound health. Criminal records may also be checked by Australian migration and visa authorities to ensure that the people being granted a visa are of good character. There is some flexibility in the way Australia's 'good health and character' rules are implemented. For example, elderly people with their only close relatives in Australia may be allowed entry although they are chronically ill, and minor criminal offences may be discounted, if the applicant has a good case otherwise to go to Australia.        
               
        All applicants for migration, or people hoping to stay as temporary residents for over twelve months, must undergo extensive medical examinations, which may cover conditions such as:        
               
        tuberculosis (TB)        
               
        hepatitis B        
               
        HIV/AIDS.

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Apart from health and character checks, age limits also apply, as in applications for a temporary residence visa for a working holiday and many categories of permanent residence applications, described in the following pages.        
               
        Visitor Visas        
               
        Visitor visas are usually issued within 24 hours and cover people who want to enter Australia for the purpose of:        
               
        tourism;        
               
        conducting business (negotiations or discussions though not for taking up employment);        
               
        visiting relatives or friends;        
               
        pre-arranged medical treatment;        
               
        a working holiday.        
               
        This is the entry visa you will probably need for an initial look at Australia the people, the lifestyle, a range of vastly differing climates and locations, as well as your opportunities for career, business or investment.        
               
        The visitor visa application form, available from the nearest Australian Embassy or High Commission, must be completed and returned with a passport-type photograph and a valid passport.        
               
        The Australian government does not require visitors to be sponsored.        
               
        An important proviso in obtaining a visitor visa is that the applicant should not intend to take a job in Australia or start formal studies. If the holder of a visitor visa is discovered to be working or studying illegally, they are subject to heavy fines and will be asked to leave the country.        
               
        Extensions        
               
        Extensions of the visitor visa may be granted under certain circumstances to people who make the application before their first visitor visa has expired, although stays totalling more than six months are not normally allowed. However, visiting academics and aged relatives of Australian citizens as well as young people on a working holiday may be allowed to stay in the country under such a visa for up to twelve months.

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Multiple entry visas        
               
        Multiple entry visas may be issued to people who state good reasons to be coming and going from Australia quite frequently for instance, parents of children living there, business visitors or people planning to interrupt their stay in Australia to travel to another country and then resume their visit to Australia.        
               
        Medical treatment        
               
        If you want a visitor visa for medical treatment in Australia, a range of requirements must be met. The applicant must convince visa officials that:        
               
        they can meet the costs of that medical treatment;        
               
        satisfactory arrangements have been made for this treatment with Australian hospital and medical specialists in advance;        
               
        such treatment is not available in their own country;        
               
        the patient will receive significant benefit from such a short term of treatment in Australia;        
               
        the patient will not pose a public health risk, because they have a contagious disease, for example.        
               
        Unless, like Britain, your country has an agreement with Australia on public health care, as a visitor or temporary resident you will not be eligible for government-funded health treatment under Australia's Medicare system. Be sure to take out a private or travel insurance policy to refund the cost of possible medical expenses in Australia. One visit to a general practitioner costs about $A36 for non-residents and others not registered under the Medicare system, payable to the doctor at the end of the appointment. Medicare allows for a partial refund. Charges may not apply for outpatient visits at public (i.e. government-funded) hospitals. Hospitals and medical care in Australia whether public or private can be extremely expensive for the uninsured.        
               
        Visas for Sydney Olympics        
               
        Special arrangements for the 2000 Olympic Games are underway, since about 6 million visitors are expected in association with this event and Australia is keen to make its immigration procedures as efficient as possible. A new category of visa has been created for

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Olympic and Paralympic family members and other people associated with the athletes. Such visitors will require only an appropriate identity card and a valid passport to travel to Australia and take part in their Games. Officials associated with the Olympics will also have access to streamlined visa arrangements, so they will not require multiple applications for visas because they need to enter and leave Australia on a number of occasions.        
               
        Temporary Resident Visas and Sponsors        
               
        This type of visa covers a range of applicants and their families who want to come to Australia to live, work or study for short periods. If the principal applicant is granted permission to take a job in Australia, the spouse and other family members coming with them are also allowed to take jobs.        
               
        The identification of a 'sponsor' is necessary for most types of applicants for temporary residency. The sponsor must be an Australian resident and        
               
        an individual        
               
        or a company, religious, educational or sporting institution        
               
        willing to take financial and legal responsibility for the temporary resident.        
               
        The sponsor must be prepared to guarantee the entrant's income while in Australia, and that the proposed job, if any, is within the terms of relevant employment awards (wages and conditions) in Australia. A sponsor is also responsible for the entrant's welfare and housing, and must pay a fee that may be as high as $A200$A300 as well as taking all the trouble to bring that person into Australia.        
               
        Working Holidaymakers        
               
        Unlike most categories of temporary residents, people allowed to take working holidays in Australia do not need a sponsor. However, in 1997 the number of working holidaymakers was capped at 50,000 due to government concern that jobs were being denied to Australia's long-term unemployed as a result. Working holiday applicants must be        
               
        between 18 and 25 years old, and        
               
        single, or couples without children.

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If you are 26 to 30, you may be eligible for such a visa under certain conditions, mentioned later in the list of criteria for a working holiday visa. One year is the usual maximum length of time for a working holiday visa.        
               
        The aim is to promote international understanding by allowing young people to get a taste of life in Australia. The money earned on the strength of such a work permit is meant to help finance more travel around the country. Getting a paid job is supposed to be incidental to the whole adventure; it should not be a career move. Since youth unemployment is relatively high in Australia, people who enter under this category must also satisfy visa officials that their working plans would not threaten job opportunities for Australians.        
               
        Finding Work on Holiday        
               
        In most towns and cities, there are usually jobs for people willing to take casual office work. Word processing skills are desirable. Register with a secretarial agency after arrival in Australia. If you have a trade or profession, there are often employment agencies to match you with an employer. Remember to take documentary evidence of your training when you go Down Under.        
               
        There are also many jobs for labourers, in bars, pubs, offices and restaurants especially in popular tourist centres which are especially suitable for working holidaymakers. Such jobs won't tie you down if your travel plans are based on saving enough in one place to see more of the country. If you hanker for a more uniquely Aussie experience, you might consider a trip to the outback financed by work on a farm perhaps as a 'cowcockie' or 'stockman' (Australia's answer to the American cowboy) doing such work as rounding up or moving livestock, mending fences, and so on. The ability to drive a motorcycle and ride a horse are useful skills on sheep and cattle stations.        
               
        Remember, if working on a 'casual' basis, some of the more attractive perks of working in Australia such as paid holidays that include holiday loading of the pay packet will not be among your working conditions. On average you can expect to earn $A200$A300 per week, and to spend about $A45 per day, according to government statistics.        
               
        Australia has working holiday arrangements with:        
               
        Britain        
       
               
        Netherlands        
               
        Canada        
       
               
        South Korea        
               
        Japan        
       
               
        Malta        
               
        Republic of Ireland

[ 本帖最后由 kennyxue 于 19-10-2009 13:25 编辑 ]