A Letter from CEO Lisa Button
The CRSA staff and board warmly congratulate the Albanese government on its federal election victory and we look forward to working with this returned government in the months and years ahead.
This outcome offers a very clear opportunity to advance our goal of expanding and improving refugee resettlement in Australia, by harnessing the power of everyday Australians. And never has it been more needed!
While community sponsorship has for many years enjoyed support across the political spectrum, the Australian Labor Party has a clearly defined goal for the future. In December 2023, the Albanese government made a welcome and ambitious pledge at the Global Refugee Forum – to progressively increase community sponsored and other complementary pathways to 10,000 additional places per year. This ambition is reflected in the ALP’s National Policy Platform and is aligned with CRSA’s own organisational goals, and those of many in our growing network of Supporting Community Organisations.
Since our organisation’s beginnings, the community sponsorship movement has come a long way in Australia. After years of research, development, advocacy and successful piloting, the government announced in February this year that the Community Refugee Integration and Settlement Pilot (CRISP) will become a ‘permanent and valuable’ part of Australia’s humanitarian program. The CRISP has seen more than 750 refugee newcomers matched with welcoming community supporter groups around the country and is having a profound and positive impact on the lives of those directly involved, not to mention the ripple effect in the broader community.
But the CRISP is just the tip of the iceberg in terms of what community sponsorship can do. We will be working to ensure that the goal of 10,000 additional places for refugees is achieved in the coming years by continuing to grow Australia’s community sponsorship movement and the various pathways that this model can support:
- Refugees without links to Australia: We will continue to advocate for the CRISP to become additional to the core humanitarian intake quota.
- Refugees with links to Australia: We will continue to develop the model and advocate for a new/reformed process for Australians to sponsor refugees who are known to them (whether through personal networks, family bonds, professional networks, shared interests/identities or some other connection) in a way that is additional to the core humanitarian quota.
- People fleeing sudden global events: We will advocate for community sponsorship to be embedded within a government-led ‘Emergency Response’ framework. This would ensure that Australia has the tools and knowhow on standby to enable the Australian community to step up when large or sudden global events trigger new intakes, like during the Afghan evacuations in 2021.
- Refugee students: Through the Refugee Student Sponsorship Pathway (RSSP) we will continue to work with colleagues in the tertiary education sector to demonstrate how community sponsorship model can help provide pathways for refugee students who wish to resettle here and study.
- Refugees with skills Australia needs: We will continue to work with colleagues leading on employer-sponsored pathways for refugees, applying the power of community sponsorship to support such initiatives.
Thank you for your ongoing support for the growing community sponsorship movement. We look forward to future collaborations with colleagues and supporters across the Australian community in the months and years ahead.