In October, Allegra hosted an information evening at St Georges with Community Refugee Sponsorship Australia (CRSA) about CRISP, a community refugee sponsorship program. This program allows community members to provide hands on support for refugee families arriving in Australia. Support can take many forms – whether that is helping find accommodation, or assisting with getting a driver’s licence, or just being a familiar face when trying to navigate a brand new country.
On the evening, we were lucky to hear from Jalal, who came from Afghanistan with his family, and one of his community supports Camilla who, as Jalal described, really became their family here. Thank you so much to both Jalal and Camilla for being so generous in sharing their experiences (Jalal actually had to head off to night shift right after) and to everyone who attended the session to learn more.
If you weren’t able to make it on the night but would like to learn more, please go to refugeesponsorship.org.au
The Community Refugee Integration and Settlement Pilot (CRISP) is a wonderful program that allows community members to help a refugee family settle in Australia.
First launched in 2022, CRISP has recently become a permanent part of Australia’s migration program after a very successful pilot run – in which Wentworth had one of the highest number of CRISP programs across the country!
Allegra Spender, our federal Member for Wentworth, hosted an information evening with Community Refugee Sponsorship Australia (CRSA), the organisation behind CRISP. We heard from CRSA as well as one of the families recently settled who’ve kindly offered to share their experience.