Labor MP  Justine Keay joins list of dual citizenship doubtfuls

Labor’s Justine Keay says the UK did not confirm her British citizenship had been renounced until after the election.

Tasmanian Labor MP Justine Keay.

Tasmanian Labor MP Justine Keay has revealed the British government did not confirm her citizenship had been relinquished until after last year’s election, raising fresh questions over hereligibility to sit in parliament.

The Coalition yesterday seized on the development, with the view of some government MPs that she had “serious questions to answer”.

Ms Keay has declined to release documents stating what date her dual citizenship was renounced but yesterday became the latest MP to give a timeline of “reasonable steps” taken to rescind British citizenship.

A person who is a dual national at time of nominating or on the day they are elected is deemed ineligible to sit in parliament under section 44 of the Constitution, unless they can show they took “reasonable steps” to renounce dual citizenship before nomin­ations closed.

Labor senator Sam Dastyari said last night he applied three times to renounce his Iranian citizenship, failing each time. He eventually employed two Iranians to go into the embassy with his renunciation papers and photograph themselves. “There’s like a selfie with these two bearded Iranian dudes and my forms,” he said.

Ms Keay said she renounced her British citizenship on May 9 last year by completing the UK Home Office’s form to give up her citizenship. The document was “officially receipted” by the Home Office on May 31 — before nominations closed on June 9 — but Ms Keay said she did not receive the British government’s declaration of renouncement until July 8, a week after the July 2 election. Britain registered her renunciation on July 11. The member for Braddon holds her seat, which Labor took off the Coalition at last year’s election, on a 2.2 per cent margin.

ANU’s professor Kim Rubenstein, who specialises in citizenship law, said as long as Ms Keay had done “everything she needed to do ­legally according to the laws” of Britain to renounce her citizenship, her steps should satisfy section 44. Constitutional law experts Anne Twomey and George Williams, of the University of Sydney and University of NSW, said Ms Keay appeared to be in a better position than One Nation senator Malcolm Roberts, who has not specified when he went through an official processes to rescind his British citizenship.

Senator Roberts, whose election could be referred to the High Court, said he had sent three emails to the British consulate in May last year and received his ­formal renunciation on December 5, five months after election day.

“There are still issues as to the exact date of loss of citizenship in relation to both Ms Keay and Senator Roberts, which would need to be clarified,” Professor Twomey said. “The difference between this (Ms Keay’s case) and Malcolm Roberts’s case, depending on what the facts are, is it would appear she filled out the form and did all the relevant steps well in advance. He just sent an e-mail.”

Senator Roberts’s spokesman yesterday declined to say when he had filled out the renunciation ­application form or paid the £321 fee but was confident of his eligibility to sit in parliament.

He said the senator planned to present further documents to the Senate when parliament returned next week, and many other MPs had questions to answer.

Greens senator Nick McKim ­received a letter from the British Home Office yesterday confirming it received his renunciation declaration form before he was chosen to sit in parliament. The party has lost two senators over dual citizenship bungles.

Additional reporting: Rachel Baxendale