FRANK Lowy, the boat person who became a shopping centre billionaire, has called on migrants to honour the ''great unwritten deal'' to follow Australian values and leave behind ideologies of hate in return for a better life in their new country.

Mr Lowy, who as a 15-year-old fled the Nazis in Europe 65 years ago, said Australia's multiculturalism had been a triumph of tolerance but would always face challenges such as last weekend's riot in Sydney.

He warned the internet and social media were being manipulated by people ''who set out to provoke''.

Delivering the inaugural Australian Multicultural Council Lecture in Canberra, Mr Lowy who is now a businessman and philanthropist, also called for a ''more muscular approach'' to civics education to teach everyone Australia's values.

Mr Lowy said while it might be ''handy for a newcomer to know that Don Bradman was our greatest cricketer'' it would be far more useful to have a bedrock understanding of what it means to be a citizen.

''You are welcome; you are free to worship; you are free to honour your heritage; and, we will respect the differences between us,'' Mr Lowy said.

''And in return, you should agree to live by the standards and values of this society, the one you have chosen to be a part of.''

''And agree to conscientiously pass on these values to your children and ensure that they receive a broad and balanced education, untainted by the ideology of hate.''

He said multiculturalism had enriched Australia in sport, the arts, science, medicine and business and asked if anyone could imagine a modern Australia made up entirely of Anglo-Celtic stock.

''We would be a warmer and somewhat larger version of the Falkland Islands - a kind of British colonial left-over not in the South Atlantic but in the South pacific,'' he said.

Mr Lowy said when he fled Europe he was on a boat built to hold 70 people that was carrying 700 and the conditions were unbelievably bad with not enough water, food or sanitation.

He said he did not want to stumble into the asylum seeker debate ''even though I was a boat person myself - in a different era and in a different place''.

He said government had a sacred duty to protect borders and honour humanitarian obligations and there were no easy ways to strike a balance to meet those twin obligations.

Speaking at the function, Prime Minister Julia Gillard said multiculturalism was ''the meeting place of rights and responsibilities''.

''The right to maintain one's customs, language and religion is a balanced by an equal responsibility to learn English, find work, respect our culture and heritage, and accept women as full equals,'' she said.

''Where there is non-negotiable respect for our foundational values of democracy and the rule of law, and any differences we hold are expressed peacefully. Where old hatreds are left behind, and we find shared identity on the common ground of mateship and the Aussie spirit of a fair go.''

The PM repeated her criticism of the weekend riot.

''What we saw in Sydney on the weekend wasn't multiculturalism but extremism.''

Originally published as How to be a real Aussie, by Frank Lowy