WHEN Rania Shahoud, her husband and their two sons arrived in Australia in 2017 from Aleppo, Syria, she didn’t know whether she’d ever find a job.

Despite family members being highly educated and professionally equipped with civil engineering degrees, each individual had to start their lives from scratch and embark on entirely new employment pathways.

Ms Shahoud arrived in Australia with zero English language proficiency and sought a role that enables her to develop her language skills without a multiple-year, qualification recognition process.

“In the first one-and-half years of living in Australia, I was just learning English,” Ms Shahoud said.

Thanks to the NSW Government’s Refugee Employment Support Program (RESP), Ms Shahoud is now employed by social enterprise bakery The Bread and Butter Project.

The Minister for Skills and Tertiary Education Geoff Lee said that when the NSW Government took an additional intake of refugees during the Syrian crisis, there was an acknowledgement that this undertaking required more support in increasing capacity to create employment and economic independence pathways for new arrivals.

“Today, NSW is leading the country in responding specifically to the needs of refugees for tailored employment programs,” Mr Lee said.

Delivered by community organisation Settlement Services International (SSI) and partners, RESP is a four-year program that supports refugees and asylum seekers into sustainable employment and addresses employment as an integrated part of the whole refugee settlement journey. 

NSW Coordinator General for Refugee Resettlement, Professor Peter Shergold said RESP had been designed to enable the public, private and not-for-profit sectors to work together while focusing on its area of expertise.

“Expertise ranges from tailored case management support, education and training, or job creation – and brings each of these elements together to deliver better employment outcomes for refugees,” Prof. Shergold said.

Through tailored employment pathway plans, participants’ barriers to employment are addressed to support and achieve individual career goals. Offering extensive support to low and high-skilled refugee job seekers, RESP is making a genuine difference to the employment outcomes of new arrivals. 

Ms Shahoud’s job success has had a trickle-down effect on the rest of the family. Like his mother, Fawzi Shahoud also engaged with the program for tailored employment support and as a direct result now works with Transport NSW.

“My son Fawzi is also civil engineer and, with the help of RESP, he has a good job,” Ms Shahoud said.

“The RESP has helped my family find jobs and be part of the community, and we are very happy.”

Since its inauguration two years ago, RESP has helped to secure employment for almost 25% of people that engage with the program, a figure that exceeds other mainstream employment programs that generally report refugee employment rates below 20 percent.

According to Building a New Life in Australia (BNLA): The Longitudinal Study of Humanitarian Migrants, an ongoing study conducted by the Department of Social Services (DSS) from 2013, after 18 months in Australia, only 17 percent of refugees are in paid employment.

With RESP, however, from the moment that a refugee participant makes contact with the program, it takes a refugee job seeker who has found employment on average 6.5 months to secure a job.

The program is designed to counteract “occupational skidding” — a phenomenon whereby refugees are unable to find work that matches their skills and qualifications — by avoiding a “one-size-fits-all” approach and developing custom-built employment pathways, designed for the long-term.

As a wrap-around refugee employment program, RESP participants have wider access to a range of activities than those supported by mainstream employment providers. Those activities aim at securing longer-term employment in a variety of industries, including transport and education.

Andrew McRae, General Manager of Eastern Region Construction at Fulton Hogan, an employer partner of the project, said bringing refugees into work has been a positive process.

“As an industry, we’re facing a shortage of people available for careers in construction, so Fulton Hogan is keen to support pathways that bring more people into skilled roles.

“Partnering with SSI on RESP not only provides jobs for refugees, but it also helps create pathways for a whole new generation of people to build rewarding careers in construction.”

SSI CEO Violet Roumeliotis said that RESP recognised that humanitarian migrants were not a homogenous group and that they had varying levels of education and skills.

“Some individuals may arrive with more significant barriers and require a longer employment pathway journey and more supports,” Ms Roumeliotis said.

She said the “secret sauce” to the success of RESP was a potent partnership between government, a highly regarded community sector, existing migrant communities and socially-minded businesses.

“At SSI, partnerships are in our DNA and, ultimately, it is the power of partnerships across industries that underpin RESP’s success,” she said.

Ms Roumeliotis said that although Australia had a successful settlement record built on the cross-collaboration between industries, she warned that it was important not to get stuck on past achievements and to look to the future.

“The time is now ripe for harvesting better long-term outcomes for refugees, businesses, and the Australian economy through continued cross-sector collaboration,” she said.

Event details:

When: Thursday 24 October 2019

Time: 5:30pm – 8pm

Official Proceedings: 6:15 – 7:15pm

Where: NSW Parliament House – Theatrette

6 Macquarie St,

Sydney NSW

………………………………………………END……………………………………………………

About SSI:

Settlement Services International is a community organisation and social business that supports newcomers and other Australians to achieve their full potential. We work with all people who have experienced vulnerability, including refugees, people seeking asylum and culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities, to build capacity and enable them to overcome inequality.

TAX Practitioners Board (TPB) chair, Ian Klug AM, has released the 2018-19 annual report, highlighting a significant change in senior management, and a dramatic spike in compliance action in the past 12 months.

"During 2018-19 there have been changes to the composition of the Board, the appointment of a new CEO, and significant resetting of our strategic objectives," Mr Klug said. 

As part of these changes, our compliance program had a dedicated focus on identifying and investigating those tax practitioners and unregistered agents posing the highest risks to the integrity of the profession and the tax system.

Mr Klug said this focus delivered the following results (when compared to the previous year):

• the number of total sanctions rose from 287 to 749 (161% increase)
• the number of terminations increased from 24 to 74 (208% increase)
• the number of written cautions increased from 182 to 540 (197% increase).

The year also saw increased collaboration between the TPB and other government agencies with a 63 percent increase in the number of referrals from the ATO to the TPB (196 compared to 120).

With the ATO, the TPB launched a joint strategy to address the outstanding personal tax obligations of almost 8,000 tax practitioners, reducing outstanding debt by around $37 million and securing over 6,600 lodgements. During this period the TPB also contributed to the Black Economy Taskforce, actioning 20 referrals from the ATO or other agencies for matters representing black economy behaviours.

Its proactive compliance program also saw the TPB auditing 1,288 tax practitioners, randomly selected for a review of their continuing professional education (CPE) responsibilities to ensure they maintain the knowledge and skills relevant to the services they provide the public.

"Most registered tax practitioners take their role seriously in addressing their ongoing professional development, however, over 80 practitioners failed these requirements and were subject to cautions and sanctions," Mr Klug said.

"The year ahead includes great opportunities for the TPB to improve its services to the public and practitioners by implementing Government reforms arising from the James Review and in our new joint compliance strategy with the ATO.

"This collaboration has a focus on 2,000 higher risk tax advisers, who advise around 2.9 million clients.

"We expect this compliance strategy will support honest practitioners, address tax system integrity and help reduce the tax gap."

Read the TPB Annual Report 2018-19

About the Tax Practitioners Board:

The Tax Practitioners Board regulates tax practitioners in order to protect consumers. The TPB aims to assure the community that tax practitioners meet appropriate standards of professional and ethical conduct. 

ends

THE Joint Standing Committee on Treaties has tabled a report on nine proposed treaty actions.

Committee Chair Dave Sharma MP says that the treaties cover a wide range of subjects from oil stocks to air services, as well as trade in wine. The report also includes the Committee’s review of the double taxation treaty with Israel, which adds to Australia’s pre‑existing network of 44 tax treaties.

"While wide ranging, each of the treaties are beneficial and present opportunities that are within Australia’s national interest," Mr Sharma said.

"The double taxation treaty with Israel will make it easier to do business between the two countries. This will bring our nations closer together, supporting increased commercial trade, investment and innovation."

In particular, the report includes a treaty extending protections for Australians in the Netherlands investigating the downing of MH17. Mr Sharma stated, "The Committee welcomes the implementation of more permanent arrangements to assist Australia’s pursuit of accountability and justice for the victims and their loved ones."

"This agreement reflects our commitment to justice over the downing of Malaysian Airlines flight MH17. Our two countries will continue to work shoulder to shoulder on this for as long as it takes."

Further information on the treaties and the final report can be obtained from the Committee’s website.

ends

THE Royal Commissions into banking, aged care and disability; the celebrity chef wages scandal; and this month’s liquidation of domestic violence charity White Ribbon Australia are just some of the cases that highlight a flaw that is now common and widespread in business – a lack of governance leadership. 

Managing director of Global Governance Initiative, Brad Sherringham, claims a governance knowledge gap at the top of many organisations has flow-on impacts for entire businesses and the communities they serve.

“We’ve seen so many examples in recent years of governance failures – from ethical and systemic problems in big banks to structural problems in small-medium family companies,” he said. “Currently, more than 90 percent of directors and executives have had no governance training, with many citing time and cost as barriers. It’s vital that they are supported to get the skills and confidence they need to govern well if they are going to lead their organisations successfully into the future.”

To address this skills gap, Global Governance Initiative is now providing participants in its online governance training program the opportunity to earn credentials in Driving strategic results, Financial acumen and Professional ethics as part of a Governance Practice credential suite. 

Mr Sherringham claims that practical, outcome-focused training is vital in the current environment where many business owners and leaders are feeling uncertain of their obligations and how to navigate forward.

“While most business owners, directors and executives don’t necessarily have time or the need for a full degree or MBA, many want the knowledge and confidence that a professionally recognised credential brings,” he said. "It's all about ensuring business leaders are supported with the tools they need to act with integrity and knowledge for the greater good."

www.ggi.community

ends