Labor for Refugees NSW/ACT

Month: September 2025

  • L4R Newsletter April 2025 – Labor for Refugees NSW/ACT

    Jenny HainesAugust 25, 2025Uncategorized

    16 April 2025   Next L4R April meeting cancelled. Our usual online meeting for Wednesday 23 April has been cancelled.  This was decided on the grounds that the date of our meeting  falls on the first week of pre-poll and as most of us are political activists, we are currently working hard in the election campaign.  It will only get busier as the 3 May election date approaches. Therefore, our next meeting will take place on WEDNESDAY 28 MAY AT 6.30PM.L4R NSW/ACT Secretary, Nizza Siano, will be overseas until the 3 June so instead of our usual monthly May newsletter, the Acting Secretary Lauren Honcope, will send out an email the week before the 28 May, reminding members of our meeting and providing you with a Zoom link.  She will send a second email with the same details, on the day of the meeting.

    We wish you every success for this crucial election.  The future for refugees and people seeking asylum, will be very bleak indeed, if Peter Dutton and the Coalition wins government.

    The Minutes of our previous meeting dated 26 March follow MinutesNSW-ACT26Mar25   Ride for Education – update   Muzafar Ali returned to our meeting last month as our guest speaker, to update us on his marathon bike ride.

    Muzafar is the Co-CEO of the Cisarua Learning Centre in Indonesia and will be fundraising for both the Centre as well as for women in Afghanistan.  To find out more about why it’s so important to support the education of women in Afghanistan, please read the details in Muzafar’s presentation which appears in our March minutes.  


    Muzafar and his team will start their ride on 31 May, departing from Maleny Qld to Brisbane and then on to Adelaide. The NSW part of their journey will commence from Murwillumbah on the 1 June and they will be in NSW until the 18 June.  

    After Murwillumbah they will ride down the coast to Grafton, Coffs Harbour, Bellingen, Port Macquarie, Dungog, Newcastle and on 13 June, will arrive in Sydney. The team will then go to the Blue Mts, Bowral, Canberra and on to Batemans Bay and Bega.   They plan to stay for 1 night in each town and are inviting anyone to join them for a coffee, dinner or chat. The aim is to raise funds for the education of refugees and women in Afghanistan. They would also love people to  join them in their ride and to organize any event around their fundraiser.  Anyone can register an event/fundraiser.  Muzafar’s team of 5 people 

    will bring their own tents and sleeping bags. They only need access to a shower and a bathroom.  So if anyone is able to meet up with this group at any of the towns listed, or can provide them with support, it would be wonderful.   If you’d like to know more about how to get involved, please see Ride-For-EducationFundraisingpage
    A list of the places and dates for each town where they will stop, follows     Ride4EducationDates-Towns Basic route information follows https://rideforeducation.com/route    We wish Muzafar and the team, every success in their worthwhile endeavour to raise awareness of the need to support both the women in Afghanistan and the excellent work being carried out by the Cisarua Learning Centre in Indonesia.
          Election policy for migration with Abul Rizvi, former Deputy Secretary of the Department of ImmigrationOn Thursday 20 March last, members of Labor for Refugees were invited by the ACT Labor International Affairs Policy Committee, to attend a Teams call with Dr Abul Rizvi as guest speaker.  Dr Rizvi reviewed the policy this term and the election contest regarding migration policy.    
    Abul Rizvi is a leading voice on Australian migration policy, with vast experience and deep knowledge of the how the system has evolved and where reform is needed.He is also the former Deputy Secretary of the Department of Immigration, has been awarded the Public Service Medal and the Centenary Medal and in his work in the Dept, headed skilled migration reform.L4R member and former Assistant Secretary Catherine Crittenden, who attended this online event, kindly drafted a report for us, on Abul Rizvi’s presentation.

    The report follows 

    DrAbulRizviElectionPlatformforElectionRefugeePolicy20Mar25Happy campaigning and look forward to seeing you at our next online meeting on the 28 May 2025.   Regards Nizza SianoSecretary L4R NSW

    email: 

     contact@labor4refugees.com