A Note From The Director
Welcome to the first newsletter of the newly established National Migrant Statistics Unit. Our unit was formed in July 2006, in partnership with Department of Immigration and Citizenship (DIAC), and we and DIAC are equally keen to support the overall goals of the unit. These include providing information to assist policy development at the local, state, territory and national levels. Policy interests extend beyond the settlement needs of migrant groups to the wider cohesion and wellbeing of our society, with its interesting and diverse mix of cultural groups. So we hope to also assist both government and non-government service providers and others with an interest in migrant and ethnicity statistics.
The National Migrant Statistics Unit has spent much of its first year becoming oriented to this field of statistics, establishing a work program and developing a range of products such as a Guide to Migrant Statistics and a Migrant Data Matrix. I am confident that you will find these products a useful way of finding and accessing relevant data - just as we have!
Our unit has also taken on the development of specifications for the next "Characteristics of Migrants Survey" to be run in November 2007, and has worked hard to improve the usefulness of this survey. In addition, we are pleased to announce that 'visa category' has been collected on the "2006 General Social Survey", which we hope will provide some enhanced analysis for data users. Of course, another major source of data will be the 2006 Census. We plan to make good use of this source and hope that you do too.
In future, the National Migrant Statistics Unit will be developing new products and reports that provide relevant analysis in this field. We are also very keen to develop our relationships with policy agencies and other data users as the unit matures. If you have an interest in this area, we would be pleased to hear from you (see 'Newsletter contact details').
Lisa Conolly
Director
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