COMMITTEES

Mr LIM (Tangney) (10:31): When I was young, my family was very poor. We were a Chinese Malaysian family that worked as rubber tappers in Muar, Malaysia. My language at home was Chinese, but on my daily walk to help my family at the rubber plantation I would walk past the homes of many Malay families.

One of those families took me in and treated me as one of their own. The family fed me, the kids and I became good friends and we shared many happy memories together. They spoke Malay; I spoke Mandarin Chinese.

So how did we communicate? Well, I learned Malay. That's also something the family taught me.

As we played and ate together, I also learned about Malay culture and Malay customs. I may not be of Malay heritage, but I can speak like a Malay and I can eat like a Malay. I understand what it's like to be Malay.

Years later, as an adult, I owned a business with operations throughout Malaysia. Some of that success was due to the capabilities I had of the Malay language, culture and people. When you understand people, you can connect with them.

You can build trust and respect. You can build relationships that are deep and long lasting. I speak in support of the report Security and prosperity in Asia: building Asia capability in Australia through the education system and beyond.

In my electorate of Tangney, I have Oberthur Primary School, which offers a well-known embedded Mandarin language program. From pre-primary to year 6, students take Mandarin language classes but also receive science, measurement and geometry lessons in Mandarin. Many of the students do have Chinese ancestry, but there are also families in the Oberthur catchment that do not have any exposure to Mandarin prior to starting school.

For these families where Mandarin is not a home language, having this greater exposure is especially critical if we want more students to be learning Mandarin. Tangney is also home to Rossmoyne Senior High School, who offer Mandarin and Japanese language classes as well as a gifted and talented program in these languages. While some students attending Oberthur study Mandarin as secondary students at Rossmoyne Senior High School, others who do not reside in the Rossmoyne catchment cannot, because Chinese is not offered at their catchment school.

For native English speakers, Chinese is a difficult language to learn. Basic reading proficiency in Mandarin requires at least 3,000 characters. On average, it takes two to five years of full-time study to reach advanced proficiency.

One of the report's recommendations is to work towards bilingual Mandarin Chinese education at secondary level in every catchment that already has a bilingual Mandarin primary. Another recommendation is to designate priority languages of Mandarin, Indonesian, Hindi and Japanese that would attract direct Commonwealth investment through measures such as Asia Leader Schools and language hubs.

I know that many constituents in Tangney will be supportive of these recommendations. Parents often approach me and ask for a solution such as what is being recommended. They see the value of developing fluency in Asian languages.

And, having invested heavily in language learning in primary school, they are frustrated when their children cannot continue this study in their secondary schools. More than 70 countries or regions have introduced Chinese language in their education system. Many education systems see the value of having Chinese language as part of their curriculum, such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

In Malaysia, Chinese and Tamil are taught with Malay and English throughout the whole education system. Asia accounts for more than 60 per cent of Australia's two-way trade. But employers do not necessarily see the value in recruiting or rewarding those who have experience and capability with Asia.

Some employers see language skills as important, but many see a person's ability to speak a second, a third or even a fourth language as something interesting rather than as a key skill. Language is important, but it does not tell the whole story. Capability means more than language.

It is an understanding and respect that is developed through deep cultural study and often significant time spent in a country, not once but over many years. It is being able to understand without needing cultural translation, and it is about being able to build relationships. Both public and private sector employers need to better understand the value of someone who can build bridges across cultures.

Around 80 per cent of member companies of the Business Council of Australia have established international operations. While we acknowledge the importance of Australia's trade with Asia, how many of us actually have Asia experience? And, for people who do have Asia experience, how is this skill measured and valued by their employers?

We need to better value these capabilities as a strategic asset. It is alarming to see that school and university language programs, in-country immersion programs and university courses in Asian studies are all declining. These courses are all part of how Australia and Australians can develop their capability with Asia.

Yet the inquiry heard expert witnesses predicting the functional extinction of the teaching of Indonesian in Australian schools by 2031. Fewer than 500 of nearly one million domestic university students study Indonesian, at a time when Australians' understanding of Indonesia is of no greater importance. Australia and India celebrated the sixth anniversary of the comprehensive strategic partnership this year.

There is a great demand for the study of South Asian languages. In my own electorate of Tangney, there are 14 different community language schools, with half of them teaching a South Asian language. But at the same time, South Asian languages are barely taught in schools or universities.

This is also an issue that has been raised with me by Tangney constituents. My community is asking for high quality learning in Asian languages with a pathway from primary to secondary to post-secondary learning in a way that is structured and provides real opportunities to develop fluency and the deep understanding that is so key to this capability. This report offers many recommendations to support a sustainable strategy to build that capability.