The electorate of Banks in Sydney is amongst the country’s list of most marginal seats, which means the voters of the area are swing voters.
Currently held by the Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs, David Coleman, Banks is known to be a multicultural community.
Testing his luck in Banks a second time since the 2016 elections is Labor’s Chris Gambian, who is contesting against the minister to win the seat that is according to media reports, said to be the “most vulnerable” in Australia’s financial capital.
“Banks does give every party a chance. I’m contesting from Banks because it is a hugely multicultural community, is my community and the Liberals have let down multicultural Australia,” says Mr Gambian as he spoke with SBS Punjabi days before the May 18 election.
Mr Gambian, born and brought up in Sydney, is of Indian origin.
“My parents came to Australia from Bangalore (now known as Bengaluru) in 1974, as a newly married couple. Labor had recently put an end to the government’s White Australia policy. I have lovely memories of my visits to India and I think everyone must visit India at least once in their lifetime for it is such an interesting place,” says Mr Gambian who identifies his family as of Anglo-Indian heritage.
Although he dwells upon the multicultural nature of his electorate and Labor’s commitment to upholding multiculturalism in Australia, Mr Gambian also stands with the bipartisan support offered by his party to the Coalition on their recent tightening of immigration laws like the reduction in the permanent visa cap and the four-year waiting period for getting welfare benefits for new residents.
“The debate on the new cap on permanent visas is an artificial one, I think. Australia wasn’t taking in 190,000 new permanent residents anyway. So in reality, it is a status quo that the Coalition has enforced. Regarding the welfare benefits, there was never any talk of new migrants accruing them straightaway,” says Mr Gambian.
Mr Gambian lays a lot of emphasis on enabling migrant families to be able to invite their parents and grandparents to Australia to spent quality family time.
“When my grandparents visited us from Bangalore, those were the best six months of my childhood,” says he, recalling his childhood memories.
Labor Party politicians pride themselves on their proposed Long Stay Parent Visa. But of late, when the Coalition proposed two new parent visa categories with fees priced at $10,000 for five years and $5,000 for three years, Labor came up with a rebuttal.
Labor’s proposal did slash those high fees by 75 per cent but used those price points as their benchmark nevertheless.
When asked to comment on that, Mr Gambian said: “If the Liberals come into power again, those will be the fees. So their price points have to be taken as the benchmark. We are proposing $2,500 against $10,000 for the five-year visa and $1,250 against $2,500 for the three-year visa. That’s a huge reduction.”
In response to this statement, SBS Punjabi asked Mr Gambian if Labor realises that more and more migrants are becoming citizens and hence voters. So can the migrant community feel confident that Labor will speak up for them and look after their expenses? Also, how does he assure migrant voters of Banks that he won’t prove to be another version of Mr Coleman if elected?
“It’s great migrants are becoming citizens. So did my parents. Labor has always stood up for the migrant community. Hawke did, Gillard did. I make myself accessible and available to people in my electorate. I give them my phone number,” he signs off sounding confident.
