Sharri Markson: Bill Shorten must stop hypocrisy on citizenship issue

IF Bill Shorten’s evasive approach to dual citizens in Labor’s ranks is any indication of how he would govern as prime minister, we are in greater danger than we realise, writes Sharri Markson.

John Tiedemann

• ALP IN CRISIS TALKS OVER SENATOR’S CITIZENSHIP
• JOYCE WILL BE LUCKY TO WIN DUAL CITIZENSHIP CASE

IF Bill Shorten’s evasive approach to dual citizens in Labor’s ranks is any indication of how he would govern as prime minister, we are in greater danger than we realise.

Labor mercilessly ­attacked the government over its frontbench dual citizens: Barnaby Joyce, Matt Canavan and Fiona Nash.

Fair enough. Turnbull’s inconsistency in kicking Canavan out of Cabinet while defending his Deputy Prime Minister’s right to remain left the government vulnerable to attack.

Sharri Markson

Labor also schemed to expose Joyce as a Kiwi, enlisting the help of a New Zealand Labour MP to lay bare his dual citizenship.

Again, fair enough. Politics is a ruthless game. But if Shorten is going to descend into the trenches and ­actively fire shots to bring down Cabinet ministers, he cannot be outraged when the gun is turned on him.

Federal Opposition Leader Bill Shorten and Braddon MP Justine Keay have been embroiled in Parliament’s dual citizenship debate.

Shorten’s approach to the dual citizenship issue has revealed him to be capable of deception when it suits him and has exposed his hypocrisy to the Australian public.

Shorten said it was “fanciful” to think she could be Ecuadorean.

Shorten, and his frontbench, have repeatedly called for Liberal MPs to cough up documentation to prove they had renounced foreign allegiances. And with all these demands being made of the Greens, One Nation and the Coalition, one might think Labor would themselves be the picture of transparency when it came to their own teams’ citizenship status.

But whenever a Labor MP is queried about their own citizenship, the same response is given: “The Labor Party has strict processes in place to ensure candidates are compliant with the Constitution. You can’t be nominated without going through these processes.”

Shorten’s sanctimonious hypocrisy is astounding and was there for all to see on Q&A last week.

Penny Wong.

Constitutional expert George Williams estimated another 20 MPs could easily be in breach of Section 44 of the Constitution for having an entitlement to citizenship of another country.

Many of those would be Labor MPs. Penny Wong has provided no proof she has ­renounced her Malaysian citizenship rights, while Tasmanian Justine Keay’s British citizenship was only confirmed as renounced after the federal election instead of at the time of nomination.

Then there’s Brian Mitchell, Susan Lamb, Maria Vamvakinou and Tony Zappia. Not to mention Senator Katy Gallagher.

Gallagher had repeatedly spoken about her British parents and had said she’d renounced British citizenship, but had barely ever made reference to the fact that her mother was born in Ecuador.

It’s like Shorten is living in some peculiar version of George Orwell’s 1984.

Hence when I came across her mother’s passenger card, showing her birthplace to be the South American nation, I asked if she had renounced her Ecuadorean citizenship, which is passed down by descent to the third generation.

A reasonable, straightforward question, one would think.

Yet it did not receive a reasonable, straightforward answer.

Shorten said it was “fanciful” to think she could be Ecuadorean.

His top adviser texted to say the story was “wrong and embarrassing”.

Senator Katy Gallagher.

Who is embarrassed now? Four days after my first query, Gallagher and Labor cannot say she is not a dual citizen. They are still in frantic discussions with the ­Ecuadorean embassy arguing over whether she needed to “apply” to activate her citizenship.

And here’s what Labor told journos: they pretended the Ecuadorean constitution only applied to people born after 2008, a statement they had no evidence for.

International Law professor at Universidad de las Américas, Quito, and the legal adviser of the Justice and Rights Observatory, Maria Dolores Mino, says that under the 2008 constitution, one has Ecuadorean ­nationality up to three generations on.

“Since under the 2008 constitution Ecuadorean nationality for children/grandchildren of Ecuadorean citizens is a birthright, you don’t have to ‘apply’ for it, you have it automatically,” she said.

John Tiedemann

“You just need to go to an embassy or consulate and have yourself registered. An ID or passport must be ­issued automatically.”

Shorten’s advisers produced no evidence to support their claim that the Ecuadorean constitution only ­applied to those born after 2008 ­before hawking the line around the press gallery, where at least some journalists bought it.

It’s like Shorten is living in some peculiar version of George Orwell’s 1984, where if he says something is the truth, then it becomes the truth. This is the lesson he clearly took from his untruthful Mediscare campaign at the last election.

The fact is, Labor is not relying on its perfect vetting of MPs to protect in the crisis that’s engulfing Parliament. It is relying on intimidation and ­obfuscation.

Shorten’s office ... is filled with young, cocky blokes who prefer to push around journalists

When this newspaper reported on the extensive number of Labor and Liberal MPs who could be caught up in the citizenship debacle but had ­refused to release documentation, the response from Shorten’s office was nothing short of bullying.

“It’s embarrassing and we’ll take the piss out of it tomorrow,” one ­adviser texted.

And when we asked questions about the citizenship of another Labor MP, another Shorten ­adviser responded with: “This is so f...king stupid.”

Shorten’s office, much like Rudd’s during his time as prime minister, is filled with young, cocky blokes who prefer to push around journalists instead of being transparent. These tactics are designed to help their politicians avoid scrutiny.

In my view, these methods have no place in Australia where we celebrate a ­vibrant, curious media and where we ferociously protect our free press and our right to know the truth.

Shorten does not deserve to be prime minister while he continues to shamelessly mislead the Australian public with behaviour that wouldn’t be out of place in Vladimir Putin’s Russia.