Media organisations over the world, from Melbourne’s Herald Sun, to UK’s The Guardian, are reporting that tens of thousands of Greeks have expressed interest in migrating to Australia even though less than 2,500 have actually migrated.
Jenny Bloomfield, Australian ambassador to Greece, told the Greek Parliament on Thursday that she hasn’t seen a significant increase in the numbers of Greeks choosing to migrate to Australia even though unemployment in the country is at 18 per cent. At the Skills Expo earlier this year in Athens – an expo set up by the Australian Government to inform Greeks on skilled migration – only 773 Greeks attended even though the event could hold 800.
In The Guardian’s article titled ‘Fleeing Greeks bank on new Australian gold rush’, they reported that: “this year alone, 2,500 Greek citizens have moved to Australia although officials in Athens say another 40,000 have also “expressed interest” in initiating the arduous process to settle there”.
News.com.au titled their article ‘We want out – and we’re coming to Australia’ and sensationalised the issue saying that “thousands of Greeks moving to Australia to escape chaos”.
Bill Papastergiades, president of the Greek Orthodox Community of Melbourne and Victoria said that the community is inundated with requests and pleas of help to migrate to Australia.