Every Australian family was once the newcomer; some arrived generations ago, others arrived last week. Yet, every generation seems to forget that fact just in time to fear the next one.

What if we stopped seeing people as migrants, refugees, asylum seekers or foreigners and started seeing them as newcomers – people beginning the same journey our own ancestors once began?

It’s such a simple shift in language, but I think it changes everything.

‘Migrant’ and ‘refugee’ are administrative categories that define how someone arrived. ‘Newcomer’ defines where they’re going. It places the emphasis on the future rather than the past and invites us to see possibility rather than difference.

Modern Australia has been shaped by successive generations of newcomers. Every wave, whether from Italy, Greece, Vietnam, Lebanon, Sudan, Afghanistan, Syria, Gaza, China, India or elsewhere, has at some point been viewed with suspicion by part of the population. There were warnings that they ‘wouldn’t fit in’, that they would have different values, take our jobs, strain our housing and change our way of life.

Over time, those communities became woven into the national fabric, enriching Australia economically, culturally and socially. They opened businesses, raised families, created jobs, paid taxes, volunteered, cared for their (and our) ageing parents and introduced foods that are now part of everyday Australian life. Australia has never been culturally static; it has continually been enriched by the people who........

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