Don Randall (Canning, Liberal Party, Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Energy and Resources) Share this | Hansard source

I speak today on the Australian Citizenship Amendment (Citizenship Test Review and Other Measures) Bill 2009. As a former Chair of the Joint Standing Committee on Migration I continue to take a great interest in matters relating to the integrity of Australia’s immigration system. There is no question that the coalition built a strong, sound, effective and fair migration system. We had measures in place to protect the integrity of that system and make sure that those who followed the rules were given full consideration. The truth is that once people are here they certainly love Australia—why wouldn’t they? This brings us to the question of citizenship.

Citizenship is more than just ticking a box and having a nice ceremony and a photo op. Citizenship embodies rights and responsibilities that should be taken seriously and with pride. The overwhelming majority of new citizens do this. I am privileged regularly to attend citizenship ceremonies throughout the electorate of Canning. I see the excitement and pride in those new citizens when they take the oath to become Australians. It is more than just a bit of paper; it is a badge of honour, an achievement and a sense of belonging.

It is perhaps fitting that I make this contribution today, Thursday, 17 September, on Australian Citizenship Day. Today marks the 60th anniversary of Australian citizenship, and annually this day pays homage to Australia’s democratic values and unity. Today around 4,000 people will become Australians, some of them right here in the Great Hall this morning. They have passed the citizenship test introduced in 2007, proving their commitment to Australia’s culture, values and history. I congratulate these new Australians and encourage them to embrace Australia’s sense of pride, civic responsibility and nationhood.

As we have heard, the bill before us seeks to make certain changes to the current arrangements for qualifying for citizenship. Firstly, it seeks to cut the time frame for persons in ‘special circumstances’ so these persons can become eligible for Australian citizenship. These ‘special circumstances’ are a thinly veiled disguise to cover elite athletes, which I will detail shortly. Secondly, it intends to amend citizenship residency requirements for people engaged in particular kinds of work requiring extensive travel outside Australia, including oil rig workers and pilots—offshore workers. Finally, the legislation exempts people with a ‘permanent or long-term physical or mental incapacity’ from sitting the Australian citizenship test when they cannot understand or complete the test.

I will deal first with the amendment relating to elite athletes. There is no denying that, as Australians, we love our sport. I am no exception. But the government wants to rewrite the immigration laws essentially to grab gold medals. Is this true Australian sportsmanship? Of course we love to win, but our sense of fair play, ‘have a go’ attitude and healthy competition are jeopardised under these amendments. The government is sending an unequivocal message that we are happy to take winners, if that can add to our medal tally, but not losers. Why are we creating a new class of special categories for citizenship? Has our passion for sport become so obsessive that we value it above all else?

This bill has been rushed in essentially to cater for the Russian ice speed skater Ms Tatiana Borodulina, who must obtain Australian citizenship in five days to be eligible to compete for Australia at the 2010 Winter Olympics. I am sure Tatiana is an extremely talented skater but she simply has not been in Australia long enough to apply for citizenship. Under pressure from the Australian Olympic Committee—and Tennis Australia in other cases—the minister had to find a means to the desired end.

Lainie Anderson in the Adelaide Sunday Mail did not hold back, and I have to agree with her. She said:

… it sends a message internationally that Australia values sport (and the quest for trophies) above intellectual endeavour and equality when it comes to migration.

With the citizenship requirement having been halved from four years as a permanent resident to two years as a permanent resident and with people only having to be here for three months of the year before applying, Anderson rightly questions why Senator Evans is even bothering. She said:

Why not FedEx our Aussie tracksuits to athletes across the globe who can’t make the grade for their own country, and tell them to turn up in Vancouver in 2010 or London 2012? Or maybe we could do the best and fairest thing and keep all immigrants on a level playing field, instead of selling out on quickie citizenships for those who look good in lycra.

What will happen to up-and-coming Australians pushed out of teams and institutes because there is a better noncitizen available? What will happen if the import turns out to be a dud—someone who is not quite as good as we thought and does not bring home a medal or who, dare I say, gets injured? Can we say, ‘Sorry, we got it wrong,’ and take their citizenship away? Of course we cannot.

It comes as no surprise that the government is all over the place on immigration policy. Last month the minister toughened up visa requirements for international students; this month he is rolling out the red carpet for sporting hopefuls. These are mixed messages. The coalition seeks to amend the legislation to have the minister exercise a discretion for those who cannot meet the residency requirements but whose citizenship can be demonstrated to be in the national interest, and still they must pass the citizenship test. However, I suspect the minister is reluctant to make those tough decisions.

You can see how it might be frustrating for people who are trying to do the right thing to see the minister making special arrangements for people who can win medals. Genuine cases come before my office frequently—immigrants desperate to become permanent residents and Australian citizens but who are not high on the minister’s priority list. Where is the justice for Mr Charles Kamwi, whose visa was refused and who has been on a bridging visa awaiting ministerial discretion since early 2008? He works for a power company in Perth and is a minister at the local Armadale church. His work rights were recently taken away, while he was on his bridging visa, forcing the cancellation of church youth programs and leaving the community with the terrible possibility of cancelling Sunday school sessions. Through my representations he has managed to have his work rights reinstated but he is still awaiting the minister’s answer.

Where is the justice for the Gorringes, Zimbabwe nationals who had a child while in Australia on temporary visas? They are not citizens and their child is stateless. They are desperate to return to Australia because their mother and extended family are here. They cannot even attempt to come back for possibly three years. As you can understand, the stress of this situation has placed an incredibly toll on their family. I had an email from their mother, Mrs Gorringe, recently, just saying how desperate this family is stranded in Zimbabwe.

Where is the justice for Angela Pillay, a nurse who was working at the Peel Health Campus, who undertook her studies at Murdoch University in Perth? Through inadvertent misinformation during the changeover in English test rules, she has been forced to leave Australia and is currently in South Africa with her engineer husband and two children. Peel Health are keen to get this trained and skilled nurse back, but they are stranded in South Africa while the paper work is recompleted.

And what about the Flemings from Zimbabwe who are awaiting ministerial discretion to stay in Australia within their children? They have been told that because they can legally live in Britain they should go there rather than Australia. They have no home there and their family is in Australia.

Another example is Emanuel Adisho, a reverend at the local church who came to Australia on a humanitarian visa. He has done all the right things and is now trying to assist his sister and family to join him in Australia. They are Iraqi Christians who fled to Syria and then to Australia. They have been assessed as refugees by the UN but have been refused entry to Australia twice. Of course, they are considerably upset to see the door open for queue-jumping elite athletes.

With respect to offshore workers, as a Western Australian, I can see the benefits in discounting the residency requirement for citizenship for professionals whose work regularly takes them offshore. Our state relies on these skilled workers. Ministerial discretion should be available in these cases. It is a fair alternative for people who cannot meet the four-year residency requirement because they are frequently outside the country. Most of these offshore workers have been in Australia for years. They have homes and families, have embraced the Australian culture and contribute to our society.

In its original form, the legislation mandated an exemption for citizenship testing for refugees who had come to Australia who had experienced ‘torture and trauma when offshore and were experiencing a temporary physical or psychological disability’. The coalition obviously had great concerns about this provision. It was clearly open to fraud and fraught with difficulties. It would have been near impossible to regulate. Considering these refugees had to have been in Australia for four years before applying for citizenship, the issue of ‘temporary’ disability following torture before they came here was problematic, if not almost redundant. We did not want to see thousands of people who knew they could not pass the test rocking up to the department of immigration with a ‘temporary psychological incapacity’ resulting from alleged trauma. The floodgates would have opened and it would have resulted in a complete bypass of the citizenship test—making a mockery of the test’s intention. We do not want ‘trauma and torture’—to take the current Sri Lankan situation, where probably most of the people in detention would qualify—used as an excuse to get citizenship when it is often impossible to verify their claims.

The government has seen the sense in exempting from the citizenship test only the people who are suffering a permanent or long-term physical or mental incapacity. The government has also removed any reference to torture and trauma and refugees. These concessions are important, given this change will avoid exempting torture and trauma affected refugees who only have a temporary incapacity. I do approach this exemption with great caution, however. While the wording appears improved, will it stand the test of compassionate doctors and coached refugees and immigrants? You can see what could happen. They could go to a friendly doctor and get a certificate, but we know that, quite often, doctor’s certificates are not as legitimate as they could be. So identifying the validity of the incapacity is something that I have concerns about. There are, however, regulations in place regarding applicants being assessed by registered medical practitioners to identify the validity of the incapacity. I can only hope that this helps avoid the situation where applicants seek favourable outcomes by using medical professionals compassionate to their cause. But, as I say, only time will tell.

The government’s approach to immigration policy is clearly quite out of touch with the Australian community and pathetic. The Prime Minister’s claim before the election—in fact, just days before—that he would turn back all boats has turned out to be nothing but a hoax on his part. Piers Akerman in an article this week has put in print what we have been saying for months. Every promise the Labor government made on border protection has been broken. He says:

Rudd said his approach to border security was based on ‘effective laws, effective detention arrangements, effective deterrent posture vis-a-vis vessels approaching Australian waters’.

Nearly two years later, the effective laws have been rendered ineffectual, the effective detention arrangements need supplementing with portable cabins and, as we saw recently, have been removed entirely for a particular group of asylum seekers, and the effective deterrent posture vis-a-vis vessels approaching our waters has been weakened to the point of non-existence.

While I am on this, I will comment on the member for Moreton’s contribution, where he said, ‘Mandatory detention; shock, horror!’ Let us remind the House who brought in mandatory detention. It was Gerry Hand, the former Labor minister. As I have said in this House before, I remember him going to Port Hedland and opening the Port Hedland detention centre along with the then Premier of Western Australia, Carmen Lawrence. It was a Labor initiative—and I understand mandatory detention is still Labor policy. We have people in this House, like the member for Moreton, saying, ‘Shock, horror; mandatory detention is evil,’ but it is still their policy.

Because of the government’s lax approach to immigration matters, Australia now has a steady stream of asylum seekers approaching our shores. Between abolishing temporary protection visas and removing the 45-day rule, which helped ensure Medicare benefits were not rorted, the government has basically issued an embossed invitation to anyone who wants to come to Australia. That invitation says, ‘If you can get here, you can stay here.’

Twelve months ago, after having called it a white elephant, the Rudd government embarrassingly opened the Christmas Island detention centre. This is a clear sign that they know their policies are not working, yet they continue to roll out the welcome mat for people smugglers, thereby destroying Australia’s strong border security protection and the integrity of our migration system. This week alone four boats have arrived off Australia’s north-west coast, ferrying so-called asylum seekers. Ashmore Reef is almost on their GPS! The Western Australia Premier, Colin Barnett, spoke out this week blaming the federal government’s changes to immigration laws for an increase in the number of asylum seekers arriving. He said:

I think John Howard had it right. “It’s not going to work – you’re going to be closed off before you get here and you’re going to be sent back. We do have to give a very clear message that you cannot get into Australia by illegal entry,” he said.

I will make a further point. The Italians have suddenly realised that the Australian system worked. Silvio Berlusconi now has an arrangement with Libya that they will meet the hordes coming through Libya, which is the staging point—and they come from as far away as Somalia and Lagos—to get to Italy. So Berlusconi now has an arrangement where they are turned back in the middle of the Mediterranean. They go back to Libya and then get sent back to Nigeria and other countries of origin in Africa. This is because they have realised what a problem it is.

The government is not heeding the message. Just compare these facts: following the implementation of the Pacific solution the amount of boat people arriving in Australia had been slashed, dropping from a total of 5,516 arrivals in 2001 to none in 2002-2003. Since Tuesday last week, 218 boat people have been intercepted on their way to Australia. Since August 2008, 32 boats carrying 1,518 unauthorised arrivals have been guided to Christmas Island, which is filling up fast. I understand Christmas Island is almost at capacity. So much for being a white elephant! This takes us to an estimated 8,000 unlawful arrivals a year if the flow continues. That does not sit well with the public of Australia. My office is continually getting messages from the electorate saying, ‘When are you people going to do something about this because it is now getting out of hand again.’

People who are genuinely awaiting entry to Australia under refugee programs miss out. We know Australia is one of the most generous countries in the world in terms of humanitarian entrance. This government is continuing with similar figures to ours, something like 14,000 people a year, which is second only, as I understand it, to Canada. And yet people who come unlawfully take their place. So the people who have been sitting in camps for years in some of the most diabolical conditions, applying through the UNHCR and finally qualifying, are then told, ‘Sorry, you cannot go to Australia this year because Australia’s quota has been filled. They have had several thousand people arrive unlawfully who have taken your place.’ That is just out of order. Australia is a great melting pot. We have many people from every nation and they are welcome here—if they do the right thing. Why would you choose a people smuggler when you can come through the UN? You choose a people smuggler because you are trying to get unlawful entry and because you know you probably cannot get through in a lawful way. This is the point at which the Australian people have a problem with the way the laws are being watered down under the Rudd government.

Before I close I want to remind the House of the people that come through my office, and other members’ and senators’ offices across Australia, saying such things as: ‘We have a family stranded in Zimbabwe. We have a family that we want to reunite.’ Ministerial discretion could apply and these people could be given compassion and consideration. Yet, because of some technical rules of the department, they are not. It is causing an enormous amount of stress and trauma. And when they see that the pull factors now in Australia are saying that if you can get here, you can stay here and you will get a visa, they feel terribly aggrieved. They have done the right thing and are trying to come here for all the right reasons. They have applied properly but then someone beats them to the punch by turning up because the laws have been softened and Australia is now a desired destination. We have real problems with people. Remember the boat that burnt recently and the loss of life? So I would point that out in terms of this bill. (Time expired)

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