TRAVEL REPORT The Hon. Michael Atkinson MP Attorney-General ...

adopting a new economic strategy, hoping to place Slovenes amongstthe most successful E .U . members ;arresting and even reversing the brain drain of educated and skilledSlovenes who immigrate to study and work outside Slovenia .prioritising a budget for research and development of science andtechnology . Slovenia has budgeted $900,000 (Australian) for this in thenext financial year .The OSA has a budget of almost 1 million dollars allocated for Slovenesabroad which is open to all Slovenian societies and clubs around the world tomake application for funding . These applications are considered on theirmerits and not allocated by country .A concerted effort has been made to maintain contact with the expatriatecommunities and encourage their involvement in the economic life ofSlovenia . One example is the seminars OSA organises every year which bringtogether teachers of Slovenian language from around the world, journalists ofSlovenian media, cultural managers of clubs, archivists and the like . Theywere happy to report that they have had an increasing number of applicationsfrom Adelaide . Rosemary Pokler, a journalist from the community radio 5EBI,made the trip recently .The organisation, Historical Archives of Slovenians Abroad (HASA) has beenactive in creating archives documenting the experiences of Slovenes abroad .Recently, an archive was opened in Sydney to serve the needs of theSlovenian Diaspora in Australia .A real problem for Slovenes in Australia is the lack of connection betweensecond and third generation . This August, OSA hosted four Slovenianlanguage teachers from Australia to attend the language seminar discussedearlier . An exciting development announced recently is an Internet languagecourse, strongly supported by Education, Slovenes Abroad and IT Ministries .It had not been determined yet whether the course would be free of charge orrequire payment.Another consideration is the creation of a lectureship in an Australianuniversity, where seminars can be conducted for the wider community therebyimproving Australian/Slovenian understanding .The delegation commented that in Australia a common phenomenon in NESBcommunities was the preservation of their language and culture as it was atthe time of their migration or "frozen in aspic" as described by the AttorneyGeneral and therefore not having kept pace with the changes in theircountries of origin . Ms Vini Ciccarello commented that one of the ways theDiaspora groups in Australia had sought to keep the language and culturealive was by organising film festivals which could more easily represent thecurrent realities of their countries of origin .Travel Report, Hon. Michael Atkinson, M.P . and Ms. vini Ciccarello MP., August, 2004 1 6