Refugee Women in Australia:

The Relationship Between Employment Status and Mental Health

Third National Women’s Health Conference 1995

Presented by: Cherie Lamb

Specialist Migrant Placement Officer

Service for the Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture and Trauma Survivors, NSW

“It is likely that two of all refugee women in Australia suffer ongoing forms of serious mental and emotional disability which arise from their pre-immigration experience but which persist for many years after their arrival, largely as a result of settlement problems... the proportion of (refugee women) afflicted by chronic mental and emotional distress is alarmingly greater than any other group in Australia, including all other NESB women” (Pittaway, 1991).

Statistically, women from refuge background have the highest unemployment rates in the Australian Labour Market. Unemployment rates for both male and female refugees are in excess of 30% in the first four years after arrival (Iredale, 1992). Unfortunately, due to workplace restructuring and the recession these figures are no longer declining according to the length of time spent in Australia.

Analysis of women’s reports in a study conducted by the Immigrant Women’s Speakout disclosed that mental and emotional conditions, especially depression and severe distress were more common amongst Non-English Speaking women who were unemployed than those who were employed or older women not in the workforce. The relationship between refugee women’s mental health and her ability to participate actively in the workforce still needs further investigation as does the impact of unfulfilling work outside the home on the downward spiral of low self esteem, depression and despair experienced by many of these women.

Refugee women are caught in a double bind. Inability to find work procedures stress in itself, especially if a woman has exhausted, all avenues of job seeking known to her. If she does find work it is generally poorly paid, repetitive and located in a stressful environment. This kind of work often leads to occupational injuries and according to a study by Schofield, Nasser and Kambouris (1993) further impedes her ability to retrain and find other more suitable employment, eventually leading to a depressive, even suicidal state. This situation is compound by unsupportive husbands and heavy family and child rearing responsibilities.

Difficulties experienced by refugee women on entering the labour market

On entering the Australian labour market refugee women experience problems specific to all migrants, all refugees and all women. As a migrant she generally has to confront language difficulties, lack of Australian work experience, difficulty with recognition of overseas qualifications, cultural differences in methods of finding employment and all too often employer’s racist and stereotypical attitudes.

She must face difficulties specific to being a refugee, including: little choice over country of resettlement, sequelae to her own premigration torture and/or trauma experiences, the losses and demands of exile, lack of social networks, dissonance, loss of independence after long periods of detention in camps, grief over loss of loved ones in war or through organised violence and the resultant chronic pain. Refugees rarely flee carrying documentation proving their educational achievements and occupational status.

Female refugees experience torture mainly in the form of sexual abuse. Pittaway (1992) believes that there is underestimation of the extent of this problem by the general public. The ramifications of this with regards to employment are far reaching, considering that most employers and union representatives in workplaces where NESB women traditionally find employment are men.

Of no less importance is her status as a woman, and as such she will unfortunately experience barriers to the labour market specific to women, such as lack of access to childcare facilities, jobs in traditional “female areas” and lesser access to higher educational opportunities. According to the State of the Nation Report (1993) the careers of 70% - 80% of women of childbearing age will be interrupted by the birth of a child. Women are more likely than men to be sole parents and the unemployment rate of lone mothers is 38%. In response to childcare restraints, women tend to either move from full-time into part-time work; less demanding work or cease employment altogether. Newly arrived women from Non –English Speaking Backgrounds tend to opt for the latter.

Refugee women therefore carry the stresses and stigmas associated with being migrant, being a refugee and being female. It is hardly surprising then that there are a disproportionate number of women from refugee backgrounds with mental health problems. These women are carrying many of the labels and stereotypes of an insecure society.

Valuable studies have been conducted about the experience of migration; refugee resettlement issues; gender issues and even the mental health of non-English speaking women. Very few of the resultant reports have targeted refugee women as a group distinct from migrants and non – English speaking women. But refugee women do have different needs. Which are separate both from the needs of NESB women and refugee men. They are the group who have been able to exercise the least choice over their own destinies. They have very limited access to government and community resources, and they have correspondingly poorer mental health than women in the wider community and even other NESB women.

The STARTTS – SMPO employment experiences

I wish to draw upon my own experience as a Specialist Migrant Placement Officer with the Service for the Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture and Trauma Survivors, NSW. Being the first employment officer to work specifically with refugees in Australia, and having been employed in this position for a little over two years, I am at a point where trends are emerging, but theories have not yet been extrapolated in relation to these. However, the trends seem to match those of Pittaway (1991), Iredale and D’Arcy (1992) and Schofield, Nasser and Kambouris (1993) with the exeption that less women are being employed in the manufacturing industry.

Emerging Trends

I would like to examine a number of trends which emerged from an analysis of my program statistics during 1994.

Unequal ratio of men to women

Of the one hundred and fifty seven (157) refugees referred to the SMPO program in 1994, only sixty seven (67) of those were women. It is as yet unclear why this unequal ration exists, although I have a number of hypotheses which are not directly relevant to this paper.

The difficulty of gaining employment

The most disturbing trend is the difficulty refugee women have in gaining any kind of employment due to the combination of factors already discussed. Of the sixty seven (67) refugee women represented in the SMPO program for 1994 only twenty (20) gained employment. Approximately twice as many refugee men than refugee women were successful in gaining jobs. Although the men on average have slightly higher educational levels than the women this factor alone is not enough to account for the discrepancy.

Lack of full time employment

Of the twenty (20) women who gained employment seventeen (17) of these people were hired on a casual or part – time basis. Casual work provides women with little stability, either financially or psychologically. There is no provision for sick pay, little union support and the insecurity of not knowing whether the job will exist tomorrow adds stress. In addition, it is very difficult to borrow money from banks with only a casual job as security.

Types of industry

Of the seventeen (17) casual and part-time positions: five (5) were for untrained child care workers; three (3) were for cleaners; two (2) were kitchenhand positions; another two (2) were sales assistant type positions; two (2) were pamphlet for deliverers and one (1) was for a machinist. The other three (3) positions were for an Interpreter, a Teacher and a Welfare Worker respectively. Process Work, the traditional domain of employment for women from Non – English Speaking Backgrounds is now quite difficult for refugee women to obtain, due to the downturn in the manufacturing and textiles industries, leaving only poorly paid jobs in the service industry.

The range of opportunities available to refugee women has decreased as a result of increased competition for jobs and the higher expectations of the skills required to perform many jobs previously accessible to them.

“Women’s Work”

All the positions gained were in traditional “women’s occupations” All except the last three required very little training or education and few skills.

The women’s educational levels do not match the jobs

Most of the women had far better education and occupational experience than these jobs reflect. For example, one of the women who gained a job as a Cleaner was a Teacher and a School Counsellor in South America. Another, who gained employment as a Kitchenhand was a Mathematics Teacher who, at the time of her escape from Iran was a third year university student retraining as a Industrial Chemist.

This data is consistent with Pittaway’s (1991) research which concludes that “professional women (who entered the country as refugees) were more likely to be employed in either clerical or trades positions and tradespeople as process workers. Process and manual workers were likely to be unemployed”. It is also consistent with OMA studies (Iredale and D’Arcy 1992) which show that refugees experience greater downward occupational mobility than non – refugees. According to OMA statistics, refugee females are underrepresented in professional, para-professional and clerical occupations compared to their pre-migration employment and are overrepresented in plant, labour and unskilled occupations.

A study commissioned by the Immigrant Women’s Speakout (1993) suggested that among employed women those engaged in full-time low skilled occupations accounted for the most depressed in the representative sample. Poorly paid work with low status is mentally equal to having no work.

Difficulty in keeping jobs

In most cases women leave these jobs within a few months because of the exploitation they so often encounter, also because the jobs are boring and rarely lead to full time, better paid work with more responsibility. The experience of having these jobs often adds tot the women’s sense of worthlessness and loss in a society in which she remains on the perimeter.

Twenty six (26) of the sixty seven (67) women represented had been unemployed for over two years at the time of their first interview. This was due to a combination of factors including; poor English proficiency; the consequences of trauma experiences impeding ability to look for work; post traumatic stress and anxiety related problems such as concentration, sleep and memory difficulties; and lack of awareness of or lack of access to available employment assistance schemes. The State of the Nation Report (1993) confirms that the length of unemployment for Non- English speaking women is longer than for Australian born women.

Risk of Occupational Injury

Some of the women in the SMPO program who had previously worked in Australia had already experienced occupational and industrial injuries. One Vietnamese women worked extremely hard as a Machinist for 13 years in order to support family members coming to Australia. She developed a brain tumour for which she underwent surgery. She also developed Repetitive Strain Injury. Although there is no medically proven casual relationship between this kind of work and brain tumours it would be easy assume an indirect link between the stress caused by this type of work environment and serious health problems.

As far as I am aware she has received no compensation for either injury, but the operation has left her with an impaired memory and with concentration difficulties above and beyond those experienced by most refugees. She has forgotten most of the English that she learned since her arrival, and she is socially isolated from her husband and teenage children. Before the war in Vietnam this woman was an Arts/law student at a prominent University with the promise of a very bright future.

The study conducted by Immigrant Women’s Speakout (1993) documents the kind of distress that is strongly linked to work related injury. Some of the symptoms may include stress related headaches, stomach ache, backache and depression. Nervous breakdowns were not uncommon amongst the women surveyed . Depression is also increased when a women’s unemployed status is the result of a work related injury.

Personal control over a woman’s own life circumstances was identified by the study as being a major stress alleviating factor. This sense of control is directly related to relationships between women and paid/unpaid work. In order to be able to exercise personal control, a woman must also have social support which is usually derived from her relationship with a significant other, and in particular, her husband.

English Language Training

Eighteen (18) of the sixty seven (67) refugee women participating in the 1994 SMPO program were placed into English training. As the average language proficiency of the women seen was low to intermediate many more could have benefited from additional English tuition but did not enroll in classes for one or a combination of the following reasons:

510 hours at AMES had already been completed;

Lack of childcare places in DEET funded courses;

DEET/CES may not target these women because either their husbands are employed or they are receiving a Social Security benefit other than NewStart allowance, and,

Family commitments restricted their ability to attend English classes.

A community based study NESB women’s mental health (Schofield et al. 1993) suggests that their is a link between poor English language ability and depression, leading to a lack of control over life experiences and circumstances.

Role Reversal and Domestic Violence

Twenty two (22) of the sixty seven (67) women interviewed disclosed that they were living in domestic violence situations. With the perpetrator being either the woman’s husband, father or brother. My suspicion is that many more are in the same predicament but have not disclosed. A high level of physical, emotional and psychological abuse in this instance is largely the result of a combination of the above mentioned problems specific to refugee like situations and traditional family structures being broken down and roles reversed. Women who would never have dreamed of working in their own countries are now insisting on supporting their families, especially if their husband (usually the bread winner) is unemployed. Alternatively, women who do not wish to work are being forced into an alien labour market by husbands who feel that the family cannot live on a single wage in today’s tough economic climate. These women have no idea what they want to do. What they are ca pale of, or how to look for a job. They are not usually proficient in English, but are reluctant to spare the time to learn.

Future Employment Prospects for Refugee Women

Industrial Reform, Multiskilling, Award Restructuring, Enterprise Bargaining and Competency Based Testing are all currently being implemented in Australian industrial workplaces. Unfortunately, whilst these may benefit the companies and some of the workers, refugees and migrants in general will reap little benefit from them.

“Competency based testing itself may require workers to possess greater levels of language and literacy than the actual tasks they are required to perform in the workplace” (Alcorso And Abood, 1992). Refugee women will be disadvantaged in both gaining employment and will have difficulty transferring to other sectors without good English communication skills.

Enterprise bargaining, whilst seen by some as the solution to Australia’s poor international economic performance, will have the effect of lowering the bargaining power of refugee women by “shifting the centre of gravity in the industrial relations system from national tripartite arenas to the workplace.. (which) is precisely the location where the power of NESB workers tends to be the weakest with regards to employers” (Alcorso and Abood).

In my own experience, refugee women have no bargaining power as employees and they have even less when they are unemployed. They are often frightened of reporting work related injuries for fear of loosing their jobs and they will often work long hours and accept low pay and poor conditions. Workplace English competency tests are often used by employers to rationalise their exclusion of Non English Speaking job applicants without being overtly racist. A particular company in the Fairfield area has a literacy test for process workers and machine operators which is so difficult that an Engineering graduate of Non- English Speaking Background failed it , even though he had completed his degree at the University of NSW.

Conclusion

The relationship between refugee women’s mental health and her employment status is an issue which needs to be taken into account by institutions undertaking employment training by government funding bodies, by service providers and by health practitioners in making assessment of a woman’s mental health. Maintaining full-time satisfying employment has always been considered a sign of good health in Australian society, in addition it has become a sign of individual socio-economic status. Employment is often the tool used to measure a persons intelligence, educational background and financial viability. Lack of opportunity in this area has a negative effect on a person’s self esteem an don their general level of functional health. For refugee women this negative effect is compounded by all of the other factors associated with being a migrant, a woman and a refugee. To exclude a person from meaningful employment is to take away their right to self determination. It is recognised by the United Nations Charter of Rights as form of human rights abuse and can be used as a weapon to alienate a human being from active participation in society.

References:

Alcorso, C and Abood, P and the Economic Stocktake Reference Group (1992) Economic Stocktake trends and issues for NESB women since 1982. Proceedings of the Politics of Speaking Out Conference,1992.

Alcorso, c and Schofield, t (1991) The National Non- English Speaking Background Women’s Health Strategy. Prepared for the commonwealth State Council on NESB Women’s Issues, Canberra AGPS

Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (1993) State of the Nation – A Report on people of Non English Speaking Backgrounds Federal Race Discrimination Commissioner, Printed for AGPS by J.S Mc Millan.

Iredale, R (1992) “Employment Opportunities for Refugees” from the Proceedings of the “Welcome Stranger” National Forum on Refugees. Sydney, 19 –21 June 1992. The Australian Catholic Bishops Conference.

Iredale, R and D’Arcy, B (1992) The Continuing Struggle: Refugees in the Australian Labour Market Bureau of Immigration Research, AGPS

Lamb, C (1994) 12 Month Activities Report – 1994 of the STARTTS – Specialist Migrant Placement Officer Program for the Migrant Employment Qualifications Board. Funded by DIRETFE, (unpublished)

Morrisey, M Jakubowicz, A (1980) Migrants and Occupational Health: A Report SWRC Reports and Proceedings No 3, Nov 1980, Social Welfare Research Centre, UNSW.

Refugee Resettlement Working Group (1994) Let’s get it Right in Australia – A Blueprint for Refugee Resettlement Services in NSW. Sydney, Nov 1994

Pittaway, E (1992) “Workshop 3 Refugee Women: The Neglected Majority” Proceedings of the “Welcome Stranger” National Forum on Refugees. Sydney 19-21 June 1992. The Australian Catholic Bishop’s Conference.

Pittaway, E (1991) Refugee Women  - Still at Risk in Australia Canberra BIR-AGPS

Schofield, T Nasser, N and Kambouris, N (1993) Non-English Speaking Women’s Mental Health: A Community Based Study. Immigrant Women’s Speakout of NSW.