Dutton’s citizenship reforms are fair and decent

PETER Dutton’s citizenship test plans are sensible. The wreckers inside and outside his party have lost touch in the Canberra bubble, writes Peta Credlin.

BILL Shorten and the Labor Party will say anything to win the next election but they cannot be trusted when it comes to border protection or the privilege of Australian citizenship.

This is because Labor thinks citizenship is a right; you want it, it’s yours regardless of whether you measure up to the values we expect every Australian to hold. By contrast, the Coalition believes citizenship comes with responsibilities and it’s fair that these are tested.

As well as keeping our borders secure, the government’s best minister, Peter Dutton, has been insisting that everyone must take the obligations of citizenship seriously.

In a country of immigrants, no one can be against immigration. Few people are more enthusiastically Australian than those who have actively chosen this country as their home.

But in recent years, a small minority who think Australia should reflect their values, and not the other way around, have began to threaten our social cohesion. Importantly, the Immigration Minister wants the power to overturn bad decisions of the Administrative Appeals Tribunal that in recent years have allowed appeals from a child rapist, drug dealers and convicted killers to gain citizenship.

This is where Dutton’s new citizenship test is so important.

You can’t be anti-immigration in a country full of immigrants, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t take care over who we give it to. Here, people at Blacktown's Citizenship ceremony on Australia Day this year are welcomed to our country. (Pic: Joey Clarke)

Essentially, he wants new migrants to wait two years longer before being able to apply for citizenship, so that we can have a good look at them as well as the other way round. He wants new citizens to have “competent” rather than “basic” English, so that they can fully participate in their new country. As well, he wants them to sign an Australian values statement including a commitment to freedom of religion, and equality of men and women. And Peter Dutton wants some evidence that would-be new Australians are making a contribution to the country by paying tax or sending their kids to school before being granted citizenship. It’s all fair and reasonable, and came out of an extensive national consultation on citizenship run by former minister Philip Ruddock in 2015.

Opposition Leader Bill Shorten originally said the changes had his “in principle” support and one of his most senior frontbenchers, Tony Burke, once strongly argued for “stricter” English language requirements too. But Labor now oppose Dutton’s changes saying that they are “incompatible with right to equality and non-discrimination” and that requiring better English is “snobbery”.

I guess we could expect no better from a party that put out the red carpet to people-smugglers but what possessed Liberal members of the parliamentary Joint Committee on Human Rights to support Labor against their own minister? Is this just the latest case of the elected MPs getting caught up in the Canberra bubble and losing touch with views of ordinary Australians or have they just lost the will to fight for the things that matter?