Young Muslims of Australia Forum

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Assalaamu 'alaikum wa Rahmatullahi wa Barakatuh

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ADJOURNMENT: Citizenship
Sen Sue Boyce (Liberal Party of Australia, Queensland, Government)
Date: 13 September, 2007
Database: Senate Hansard

Today we see the start of Ramadan, an important time in the calendar
for a great number of Australian citizens. I would like to extend to
the Muslims of Australia best wishes for this month of fasting, a
ritual that many of the 340,000 Muslims around this country will
undertake over the next 30 days. During Ramadan Muslims will not
partake of food or drink from sunrise to sunset and they will engage
in extra prayers. The month of Ramadan marks the revelation of the
Koran, the holy book of Islam, about 1,400 years ago.

The Muslims have been in Australia for more than 200 years, with some
historians suggesting they were here before the First Fleet, with
Macassan Muslims trading with Indigenous groups across Northern
Australia. Since this time, Muslims have come from many different
lands to make a contribution across many different areas in the
development of Australia. We all know of the Afghani camel drivers
who helped open up inland Australia, building the Overland Telegraph
Line and the railways. There were Bosnian workers on the Snowy
Mountains scheme and, in North Queensland, Muslims were pioneers of
the sugarcane and tobacco industries. Their stories are sometimes
overlooked but their contributions should never be forgotten.

Today, almost 40 per cent of Australian Muslims were born right here
in Australia. And whether they are 'new' or 'old' Australians we see
Muslim success at the highest level of business and sport, with
people like John Ilhan, the owner of Crazy John's phone company;
Ahmed Fahour, the CEO of the National Australia Bank; Hazem El Masri,
the great point-scoring rugby league player from the Canterbury
Bulldogs; and Bachar Houli, the first Muslim playing in the AFL, for
Essendon.

The Muslims are among our professors, surgeons, teachers, bakers and
scientists. According to a Family and Community Services and
Indigenous Affairs report released just last month, Muslims have an
above-average proportion of postgraduate degrees compared with the
rest of the Australian population, and one of the most common
languages spoken in Australian Muslim homes is English. In
Queensland, my home state, English is the most common language spoken
in Muslim homes. In business, the halal meat industry contributes $5
billion annually to the Australian economy and employs more than
30,000 people.

All of Australia has had the opportunity to learn a little about
Islam over the past six months with the Family and Community Services
program Sharing our Achievements. Sharing our Achievements was a
whole-of-government initiative that originally came out of the Prime
Minister's Muslim Reference Group established for the purpose of
explaining to wider Australia the successes and contributions of
Muslim people. Sharing our Achievements has now produced a report
that showcases Australian Muslims in each state and their
contributions to our country. FaCSIA has reported that the program
was a great success with many thousands of non-Muslim Australians
learning what their fellow Muslim countrymen and women have
contributed over the past 200-plus years.

http://parlinfoweb. aph.gov.au/ piweb/view_ document. aspx?
id=2484433&table=HANSARDS

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"Except the one who comes to Allah with a sound heart"