The unmentionable problem of Australian citizenship.

• Author: Stone, John
• Position: 155873238
• Pages: 12(13)

On Sunday, 17 September last, the Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs, Mr Andrew Robb, issued a discussion paper entitled Australian Citizenship: Much More than a Ceremony, to provide a "consideration of the merits of introducing a formal citizenship test". Readers of National Observer will know that I have long favoured such a test. (1) It may therefore appear ungrateful to say that this paper, while not wholly worthless, largely succeeds in missing most of the basic issues involved.

Before proceeding to enlarge upon that judgment, it is fair to recognise that Mr Robb himself would have been subject, in finalising his paper, to two major constraints:

First, and almost certainly the more important, he is the parliamentary secretary to Senator Amanda Vanstone, whose period in office as Minister for Immigration and Multicultural Affairs has been one of almost unmitigated disaster for Australia (with consequences, I suspect, for the Government at the next federal election). Thus, even if Mr Robb had wished to produce a more meaningful document, he would undoubtedly have encountered difficulty in having that approved by his Minister.

Second, whatever may have been the already compromised draft paper that Mr Robb would then have submitted for Cabinet's consideration, we also do not know what changes Cabinet itself may have demanded in that draft.

While, therefore, I shall have many criticisms of this document, it does not follow that they should all be visited upon Mr Robb's own head.

In examining the paper I first focus on its basic failings. I then mention some useful informative aspects. I then show how, repeatedly, the paper's failure to address the right issues leads it into error. Finally, I address the four "key questions" (and 16 other questions) to which it seeks responses from the public (albeit by a date, 17 November, before this article is published).

NOT EVEN A CAMEL

A camel, it has been said, is a horse designed by committee. Yet, while there is much of the camel (so defined) about the Robb paper, the more fundamental problem is that its designers did not even set out to produce a horse in the first place. Not surprisingly, therefore, their product is not even a camel.

To understand that comment we might look at Mr Robb's two statements accompanying the paper's release. One, headed "Formal Citizenship Test" discussion paper released, sought "public reaction to a proposal to introduce a formal citizenship test". The other, entitled New Requirements for Australian Citizenship, focused on "new residence requirements" that will mean migrants "would be required to have a minimum of four years' lawful residence in Australia immediately prior to applying for Citizenship". (2) This change, Mr Robb said, "together with the proposed citizenship test, with its English language requirement", will "help ensure citizenship applicants have had sufficient time in Australia to become familiar with our way of life and appreciate the commitment they are making when they become citizens".

At first glance, all that might seem sensible enough. A Sydney talk-back radio host, interviewing the Prime Minister on 18 September, said that to him, the paper seemed merely "common sense". (3) And so, up to a point, it does. Yet its basic deficiencies, already apparent in those two Robb statements, may immediately be seen by asking the following three questions:

1). Why, in discussing the citizenship question, is there no mention of the fact that Australia is now embarked on a War against the Islamists? (4) This war gives every prospect of lasting even longer than the 1945-1989 Cold War against another form of totalitarianism/imperialism, and raises the same questions about personal loyalties to Australia (and hence requirements of citizenship) as did that earlier long-drawn-out conflict.

2). Against that background, what is the ultimate reason for this proposed change in the citizenship laws?

3). Why, in focusing on the requirements for citizenship of immigrants already in Australia, is the paper carefully skirting around the prior question of conditions governing admission to Australia in the first place? (5)

THE PAPER'S BASIC FAILINGS

With these three questions in mind, how has it come about that the government is proposing "new [and somewhat tougher] requirements for Australian citizenship"? After all, it is not so long since this same government was busy relaxing those requirements. Indeed, in 2002 it went further, repealing section 17 of the Australian Citizenship Act 1948 to enable those Australians who actively (6) acquire another citizenship (i.e., swear loyalty to another sovereign state) to retain their Australian citizenship notwithstanding. Some results of this were seen in southern Lebanon earlier this year!

Changes such as this were made, by both major political parties and by bureaucrats, as part of the ongoing program to transform Australia into a truly multicultural country--one in which the savagery of (say) Somali culture should be accorded equal respect to Australia's civilized (even, if you like, effete) "core" Judeo-Christian culture.

So, why do we now have a "discussion paper" seeking public views on proposals that would involve, not a reversal of those engines, but at least some deviation from the previous "full speed ahead"?

The answer is obvious; and what is both fascinating, and deeply disturbing, is the paper's total failure to refer to it. It is, of course, the emergence in our midst of an already serious, and steadily growing, cultural problem emanating chiefly from Australia's Muslim community. At the risk of resorting to a cliche, this is the (unmentioned) elephant in the room.

The paper's telling silence on this point is extraordinary. It is also, as I say, deeply disturbing: for it tells us that the government is unwilling to address openly the most important issue that, in the years ahead, will govern Australia's future and that of the world. Instead, we have a paper raising "for consideration" proposals that, even if adopted in full, will barely begin to address that Muslim cultural problem.

The more closely one reads the paper (particularly as a former public servant not unfamiliar with such things), the more one is struck by the strangeness of its construction--a strangeness deriving directly from its failure to address, openly, the issue giving rise to it. Consider, for example, the following points, among many more such that could be made:

* Part 1 of the paper is entitled "Background to current arrangements and policy", and begins with four nugatory paragraphs headed "Why does Australian citizenship matter?" The chief reason it matters is the grave situation in which Australia now finds itself, and the relevance of citizenship to that situation. Yet nowhere does the paper refer to that.

* The next five paragraphs are headed "What are the privileges and responsibilities of citizenship?" Despite beginning with the wholly proper statement that "Australian citizenship is a privilege, not a right", they are almost wholly devoted to the rights and privileges that citizenship bestows on those who...