This seems a better day than most to mention that Peoples Coffee has stepped up to become Public Address's new coffee sponsor. And that's because, to mark World Refugee Day, the good people there are donating all proceeds from their Wellington cafe to Multi-Cultural Learning & Support Services, aka MCLaSS.
MCLaSS offers free education and support for adult refugees and migrants through beginner ESOL literacy courses, job brokering, career coaching and English skills assessment.
At a time when Tracey Barnett has had to write The Quiet War on Asylum (see her Sunday Star Times column about the background to the book here), it's heartening to see people pushing the other way.
This also seems a good day to remind you of two of the most compelling posts to appear on Public Address. In 2006, before he had a permanent home on the masthead, David Haywood published these two first-person accounts, drawn from interviews:
Refugee Stories Our Politicians Never Tell Us: Part I - Shahzad Ghahreman
Refugee Stories Our Politicians Never Tell Us: Part II - Lan Le-Ngoc
Those posts predate our discussion community, but you can feel free to comment here now.
Thanks to Peoples Coffee for bringing David's amazing posts to mind. Here's to a long and beneficial relationship.