Hygiene lessons will help migrants integrate: Coalition

NEW immigrants should be taught about the Australian customs of wearing deodorant and waiting patiently in queues, the Coalition says.

NEW immigrants should be taught about the Australian customs of wearing deodorant and waiting patiently in queues as part of a program to help them come to grips with local culture.

Opposition citizenship spokeswoman Teresa Gambaro has also called for mandatory "cultural awareness training" to be taught by employers who are bringing in immigrants for work under programs such as 457 visas.

Ms Gambaro said she was concerned that new immigrants who had come on visas for work were not integrating into the community and that the nation was failing its obligation to teach them how to fit into Australian culture on issues such as health, hygiene and lifestyle.

"Without trying to be offensive, we are talking about hygiene and what is an acceptable norm in this country when you are working closely with other co-workers," Ms Gambaro told The Australian.

She said practices such as wearing deodorant and not pushing in when lining up were "about teaching what are norms in Australia". "You hear reports of people using public transport (without deodorant) and I think Australian residents are guilty of this too," she said. "I think we all need to be mindful of our fellow traveller. Sometimes these things are not talked about because people find them offensive but if people are having difficulty getting a job, for instance, it may relate to their appearance and these things need to be taken into account."

Ms Gambaro said while her comments could be painted as controversial and would make some people "most upset", she said it was equally important that immigrants were taught about laws, customs and their rights so they were not exploited.

The number of 457 temporary business visas granted was 90,120 last financial year, rivalling the 113,725 visas issued under the government's priority program for permanent skilled migration.

Ms Gambaro's comments came a day after Coalition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison told The Australian temporary immigrants were not integrating into the broader Australian community. Mr Morrison said the government's multicultural strategy was failing because it was too obsessed with "symbolism" and government-funded English language courses were not teaching immigrants properly.

The Immigration Minister, Chris Bowen, yesterday hit back at Mr Morrison's criticism of multicultural policy. "It's a bit rich for Mr Morrison, who has previously said he doesn't like the word 'multiculturalism', to now be criticising a landmark policy to further strengthen our multicultural programs and help to ensure government services respond to the needs of migrant and refugee communities," a spokesman for Mr Bowen said.

"It is bizarre for Mr Morrison to say there should be more language support for temporary migrants when it is he who has consistently said the English-language requirement for incoming temporary migrants is too hard.

"He should know that English-language testing is a key component for the vast majority of temporary-visa application requirements to help ensure a smooth transition into Australia."

In February last year, Mr Bowen announced changes to the government's multiculturalism strategy, including beefing up the Australian Multicultural Council, which will now act as a "champion for multiculturalism" and advise the government on how best to direct services to new migrants. The government also established a "national anti-racism and partnership strategy".

But Ms Gambaro said cultural awareness training was desperately needed for immigrants to help them enjoy life in Australia more fully. "The detail of this has to be worked out -- whether it's included as part of a visa charge for certain industries or done through a labour-hire firm," she said, adding there were going to be problems as more workers arrived in Australia. "You are going to have a whole pile of people coming in," she said. "If you're a mining company you'll have a whole pile of people coming in from India or China or anywhere else you need to have socially skilled workers.

"It's not just about having bodies in the workplace. If they are going to have a good experience working for us here in Australia they need to have cultural awareness and socially skilled workers as well as being work-skilled workers.

"They need to teach what the local laws are here, what is acceptable in a tenancy arrangement. All of this should be included. It should be about lifestyle, health and hygiene. It's how to fit into Australian society."

She said people living in Australia for years on end needed to be aware of the cultural norms.

"We do this sort of stuff on a very limited basis when we send troops over to Afghanistan and Iraq," she said.

"We put them through cultural awareness training; we need to do the same when they come into Australia because they will have a better experience.

"We think that people know what the norms here are, but they don't and sometimes it does cause a considerable amount of angst. You just cannot have hundreds of thousands of people coming into a country without this, you're going to have issues."

She pointed to an example of a man on a working visa going to hospital with his heavily pregnant wife only to learn that they were not obliged to deliver her baby. "There are cases like that where people aren't aware of what their health entitlements are. He was very distressed when he contacted our office," she said.