Kep Enderby Memorial Lecture 2026

You’re invited to attend the 2026 Kep Enderby Memorial Lecture

Racism and the scapegoating of migrants: Reshaping the narrative on immigration.

Join us for this important and thought-provoking event that will examine racism towards migrants, current public narratives about immigration and the impact on migrant communities and others affected by racism.

This year’s orator is Mariam Veiszadeh - DEI Executive, Anti-Racism Expert & Human Rights advocate.

This will be followed by a dynamic panel discussion moderated by writer and broadcaster Ben Law.

Panellists:

• Adama Kamara, Co-CEO of the Refugee Council of Australia

• Braden Hill, Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Students and Education) at Edith Cowan University

• Laurie Berg, Co-Executive Director of the Migrant Justice Initiative

• Giridharan Sivaraman, Race Discrimination Commissioner
  

Event details 

Monday 2 November

• 12.30pm - 1.45pm

• FREE event

• Online only

Information and registration

The lecture will be delivered online via Zoom. 

AUSLAN interpretation and live captioning will be available. 

Speakers and panellists

Mariam Veiszadeh - DEI Executive, Anti-Racism & Human Rights Advocate

Mariam is an award-winning DEI executive, former lawyer and human rights advocate. She came to Australia as a refugee from Afghanistan and has spent more than a decade working on anti-racism, migration and belonging, including as a spokesperson for the Afghan Australian Advocacy Network during the fall of Kabul.

She is founder and Chair of the Islamophobia Register Australia and former inaugural CEO of Media Diversity Australia, where she focused on how migrant and culturally diverse communities are represented in Australian media. She is currently Executive Director at MindTribes a specialist diversity, equity and inclusion consultancy focused on race, gender and cultural diversity. A TEDx speaker and experienced non-executive director, Mariam was named the 2023 Most Influential Asian-Australian of the Year.

Adama Kamara - Co-CEO of the Refugee Council of Australia

Adama has shared the role as Co-CEO of the Refugee Council of Australia (RCOA) with Paul Power since February 2026. In this capacity, she leads the organisation’s community engagement and governance, ensuring RCOA’s advocacy remains deeply connected to the communities it serves. 

Laurie Berg - Co-Executive Director of the Migrant Justice Institute

Laurie is one of Australia’s leading legal researchers on migrant workers’ rights. She has conducted major international and national studies on migrant worker wage theft, exploitation and access to justice in Australia, and globally. Her book, Migrant Rights at Work: Law’s Precariousness at the Intersection of Immigration and Labour published by Routledge in 2016, was the first on migrant workers’ rights in Australia.

Professor Braden Hill - Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Students and Education)

Professor Braden Hill (he/him) is a Noongar (Wardandi) man from the south-west of Western Australia and Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Students and Education) at Edith Cowan University (ECU), where he leads a portfolio spanning teaching and learning, student experience, access and equity, student success, and graduate outcomes. He has held several senior leadership roles at ECU, including Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Students, Equity and Indigenous), Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Equity and Indigenous), and Head of Kurongkurl Katitjin, ECU’s Centre for Indigenous Australian Education and Research. Prior to joining ECU, he was Director of Aboriginal Education, Equity and Inclusion at Murdoch University.

Professor Hill is nationally recognised for his leadership in Indigenous and LGBTQIA+ research, and for his work advancing equity, inclusion and student success across higher education. He also reaches a wide public audience through social media, with nearly 100k followers on TikTok, using the platform to translate education, equity and policy issues for broader community impact.

Giridharan Sivaraman - Race Discrimination Commissioner

Prior to becoming Commissioner, Giridharan was Principal Lawyer with Maurice Blackburn, where he ran numerous state and national race discrimination cases. He was also Chair of Multicultural Australia (2021-2024) and a member of the Queensland Multicultural Advisory Council (2019-2024), advocating for the rights of victims of racial vilification.

Event MC and moderator

Benjamin Law - writer, broadcaster and an AWGIE Award-winning screenwriter

Benjamin has written for over 50 publications including The Monthly, frankie, The Guardian, and Monocle and is one of Australia’s most prolific interviewers. Benjamin has deep-dived with Jennifer Coolidge to a crowd of 8000, chatted with Martha Stewart to an audience of 3500, and interviewed the likes of Bernie Sanders, Gloria Steinem, David Suzuki, Michelle Yeoh, Behrouz Boochani, Matthew McConaughey, Roxane Gay, David Sedaris and Brian Cox – both the English physicist and Scottish actor – for his weekly column in Good Weekend.

Technical production of this event is proudly managed by The Social Deck.