• Entry type: Organisation
  • Entry ID: AWE2131

Interdepartmental Working Group Taskforce on Migrant Women

(From 1977 – 1977)

Summary

In 1977, when the Galbally review of Post-Arrival Migrant Programs and Services was announced, Senator Margaret Guilfoyle wrote to the Prime Minister advising him of the specific problems and special needs of migrant women. In June of that year, Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser asked the Office of Women’s Affairs to set up an Interdepartmental Working Group Taskforce on Migrant Women. Officers from the following department were involved:

  • Immigration and Ethnic Affairs
  • Social Security
  • Employment and Industrial Relations
  • Productivity
  • Health
  • Education
  • School’s Commission

Under extremely trying conditions, including endless delays caused by the Department of Employment and Industrial Relations, the taskforce completed its report in November, just making the deadline to be considered by the Galbally Review. Among other things, the report recommended that ‘wherever possible action should be taken to provide services through or in co-operation with ethnic organisations and migrant women’.

The report was regarded as a valuable resource for implementation of Recommendation 43 of the Galbally Report.

Published resources

  • Report
    • Interdepartmental Working Group On Women's Affairs: Report of Task Force on Migrant Women, Office of Women's Affairs, 1977
  • Book Section
    • Double Disadvantage: Migrant and Aboriginal Women, Sawer, Marian, 1990
  • Resource

Related entries


  • Related Women
    • Guilfoyle, Margaret Georgina (1926 - 2020)
  • Related Organisations
    • Office of Women's Affairs (1974 - 1977)
  • Related Events
    • Review of Post Arrival Programs and Services to Migrants (1977 - 1978)
  • Featured Organisation
    • Being Seen And Heard: Migrant Women Organising In Australia, A Documentary History (2006 - )