Generally, the stricter citizenship laws are set to make it harder to obtain and maintain Australian citizenship.The proposed amendments set out in the Australian Citizenship and Other Legislation Amendment Bill 2014 are as follows:
These amendments are over the top and in relation to the proposals concerning children constitute a traversal of the obligations under CROC.
Consider the following:
"limit automatic acquisition of citizenship at ten years of age to those persons who have maintained lawful residence in Australia throughout the ten years...."
My problem with this is that children have no say in their parents legal status. the denial of "automatic" citizenship for a child born in Australia and who turns 10 here is not some sort of con on the Australian public it simply recognises that children born here in effect , over the passage of time become acculturated. Their parents status has nothing to do with that.
The case of Paul and the AHRC establishes the principle that the Minister must consider CROC and ICCPR obligations which arise in the course of the consideration of section 351 and section 417 applications for ministerial intervention.
These amendments reflect the dead hand of DIBP on the relevant law and the incitement to the Minister to in effect promote these changes and to start making decisions personally which are not amenable to review or where there is review at the AAT to overturn that decision is completely over the top.
The current trend at Citizenship is to refuse all citizenship even in the face of minor character issues. DIBP simply cannot be trusted to do this work. At every turn they want to reduce judicial oversight, merits review and import powers to the Minster to act personally at the incitement of the press and other commentators to avoid political embarrassment.
DIBP is constantly trading off the "integrity" issue and creating the false impression that Citizenship is being abused.
Put simply there is enough power vested in the Minister under the current statutory scheme with appropriate checks and balances to ensure that the integrity and the importance of Australian citizenship is maintained.
If the Minister wants to curtail abuses he should start with DIBP, strengthen independent merits review and where it is in the national interest suspend travel rights for Australian citizens who are acting contrary to the national interest. This 'reserve" power has been vested in Foreign Affairs since year dot.
There is simply no justification for these wholesale changes. As they say in the classics if it ain't broke don't fix it.
Scott don't do it, get some proper advice.
Don't listen to the DIBP drones they haven't had an original idea since 1958.
"Powers" to act on suspicion alone (without proving guilt).
"Powers" to act without the affected party having the right to merits review.
"Powers" to ignore tribunal findings.
Aren't we lucky to live in a "democracy"?
Isn't it great that we can always "see" justice to have been done?
Wouldn't it be terrible to live in a country where the "government" can make arbitrary decisions that could not be challenged?
Quick! You have made a spelling error! Its Citizenship NOT Citizeship - see the heading