Here is a news story that will make no sense whatsoever to anyone who is not Australian - and, indeed, shouldn't really make any sense even if you are Australian. From The Sunday Times of Perth:
Senator Parry has released a statement confirming he will step down as President of the Senate and resign his seat if British authorities say that he is a British citizen.
The senator is still awaiting confirmation from the authorities... "As a result of this I have had cause to examine my citizenship status in relation to my late father having being born in the United Kingdom," he said.
"My father moved to Australia as a boy in 1951.
"He married my mother in 1960 and I was born that same year in Burnie.
"I have always regarded my late father as Australian, particularly as he undertook his national service and participated as a member of the Australian Army Reserve and voted in every Australian election since adulthood."
But not so. As my old comrade Andrew Bolt put it:
Britain on Wednesday confirmed he was one of theirs.
"One of theirs." A deep sleeper. He's probably been working for them for decades, getting his instructions from a dead-drop in a tree-trunk round the back of the High Commission... He almost gave the game away once, saying "Blimey!" instead of "Crikey!", but fortunately he recovered and pretended to like "Neighbours". No, wait, hang on...
At any rate, a senior member of the Australian cabinet, born and bred in Australia, turns out to be ineligible for Parliament because the bureaucracy of another country from whom he has never sought a passport has determined that via a deceased parent he is a citizen of theirs.
Gotcha. Welcome to the wacky world of the Australian constitution, specifically Section 44, under whose expansive interpretation by the High Court Canberra's most illustrious parliamentarians are dropping faster than Harvey Weinstein's robe. Tim Blair has a convenient cut-out-'n'-keep guide here, noting the crimes of which these sinister semi-aliens have been found guilty:
The Deputy Prime Minister of Australia, Barnaby Joyce, is a closet New Zealander;
Mr Joyce's deputy, Fiona Nash, is a covert Scot;
Scott Ludlam and Larissa Waters, both of the Greens, turn out to have, respectively, Kiwi and Canuck carbon footprints that glow in the dark;
and Malcolm Roberts, of the One Nation Party, is in fact a Two-Nation Party all by himself, still holding UK citizenship because, although he renounced it, he sent his renunciation to the wrong address - a kebab shop in Cairns rather than the British High Commissioner in Canberra. Easy mistake to make, but in this case fatal.
Mr Joyce was born in Tamworth, New South Wales. His grandfather landed at Gallipoli and was a bodyguard to the Prince of Wales. Unfortunately for him, his father was born in New Zealand at a time when neither Australian nor New Zealand citizenship existed. Even today, Australia and New Zealand are part of the Trans-Tasman common travel area, and their citizens can live and work in each other's countries, leading many innocent Australians to be lured into Kiwi honey traps.
A casual observer might have assumed that a crisis about "allegiance to a foreign power" Down Under would be something to do with the remarkable number of "Australians" signing up for the Islamic State and head-chopping their way across the Levant and the Sunni Triangle. One thinks, for example, of Khaled Sharrouf's seven-year-old son, born and raised in Sydney but an Internet sensation after he was snapped waving around the bloody, dripping head of a Syrian soldier. Yet the Australian state is genially relaxed about that. It's only when Fiona Nash starts waving around a bloody, dripping haggis that everyone shrieks, "Oh, my God! How did she get in here?" I scoffed at this dual process en passant during my column on the bike-path jihadist, and was promptly taken to task by one of our Aussie readers, who helpfully styles himself "Aussie":
This wasn't a bone headed jurist vote, it was 7-zip in our equivalent of the Supreme Court, and for once it was the black letter of the law. The Australian constitution clearly states you cannot be elected to parliament if you hold allegiance to any other country. So these people who had dual citizenship had no right to be in parliament, and they were correctly kicked out. It was the exact opposite of judicial activism.
Let's unpack that a little. What the 1901 Australian constitution "clearly states" is a prohibition against "holding allegiance" not to any other country but to a "foreign power":
Any person who -
(i.) Is under any acknowledgement of allegiance, obedience, or adherence to a foreign power, or is a subject or a citizen or entitled to the rights or privileges of a subject or citizen of a foreign power...
shall be incapable of being chosen or of sitting as a senator or a member of the House of Representatives.
The key words there are "a foreign power". What does that mean? Well, the Australian constitution is an act of the Imperial Parliament at Westminster, so it seems unlikely, per the above-mentioned Senator Parry, that the English, Scots, Irish and Welsh who passed it intended to categorize themselves as foreigners: As the great Ken Dodd likes to joke, "The French are jealous of us because we're not foreign." In 1901, the peoples of the Empire belonged to a single indivisible category of "British subjects", whether resident in Kingston-on-Thames; Kingston, Ontario; Kingston, Jamaica - or Kingston-on-Murray, South Australia. That's the distinction enshrined in the Australian constitution: non-foreigners are British subjects; foreigners are everyone else. So the same High Court that's just blown up the Australian parliament ruled in 1906:
We are not disposed to give any countenance to the novel doctrine that there is an Australian nationality as distinguished from a British nationality.
The view of that 1906 High Court prevailed until the 1948 Commonwealth Conference, when it was decided that His Majesty's dominions would each set up their own citizenship as sub-categories within the pan-imperial "British" nationality: Thus the inauguration of Canadian citizenship, United Kingdom citizenship and Australian citizenship. And hence the original name of Australia's 1948 "Nationality and Citizenship Act", the first part of which dealt with British "nationality" and the latter with Australian "citizenship". For example:
7 . — (1.) A person who, under this Act, is an Australian citizen or, by an enactment for the time being in force in a country to which this section applies, is a citizen of that country shall, by virtue of that citizenship, be a British subject.
So, again, in 1948 a "foreign power" meant China, the United States, Ethiopia, Yugoslavia ...but not the ancient sod of the Parry family. When Senator Parry's dad emigrated from Britain to Australia in 1951, he might well have converted to the new two-year-old Australian citizenship, but there was no legal or practical reason to do so. Even if he had adopted Australian citizenship, the Australian passport he would have traveled on was, in fact, labeled a "British passport". Indeed, when Senator Parry was born in Oz in 1960, if he ever traveled as a child on his own Australian passport it too bore the words on the front cover "British passport", until the late Sixties. And even after these Antipodean "British passports" became purely Australian passports, Australia's passport office nevertheless continued to issue passports to non-Australian British subjects resident in Oz (from the UK, Canada, New Zealand, India, Malaysia, Jamaica, you name it) until 1984.
So for the first 83 years of federation Barnaby Joyce's New Zealand, Fiona Nash's United Kingdom and Larissa Waters' Canada were overseas powers but not "foreign" powers. That reflects both the intention of the drafters of Section 44 and the lived reality of Australians: for example, five years ago, Aussies had a political choice between a Prime Minister born in Wales and a Leader of the Opposition born in England.
What changed? Well, a couple of ill-considered High Court decisions (particularly the 1999 Hill case) transformed the plain meaning of the law into a shrunken reductio of its former self. The latest bizarre ruling by the Australian High Court now goes into excruciating case studies on each of the tainted semi-aliens. For example, Larissa Waters:
- Ms Waters was born in February 1977 in Winnipeg, Canada to Australian parents who were living in Canada at the time for study and work purposes. Neither was a permanent resident of Canada. Ms Waters' birth was registered with the Australian High Commission in Ottawa in June 1977. It was not in doubt that Ms Waters was an Australian citizen by descent. In January 1978, as an infant aged 11 months, Ms Waters left Canada with her parents, who were returning to live in Australia.
- Ms Waters has never held a Canadian passport. She has not visited Canada since leaving it in January 1978. She has always considered herself to be an Australian and has never understood that she owes allegiance to any other country. She has not sought or received consular assistance or any other kind of government assistance from Canada and she has not exercised any rights as a Canadian citizen. Her mother had given her to understand that she would be eligible to apply for Canadian citizenship when she turned 21. On turning 21 in 1998, Ms Waters considered applying for Canadian citizenship but she decided against it.
As it happens, Larissa Waters or any other Australian citizen is fully entitled to "seek or receive consular assistance" from Canada under the Canada-Australia Consular Services Sharing Agreement. So, depending where she is on the map, she could pick up an Australian passport at a Canadian embassy or a Canadian passport at an Australian embassy: that's how "foreign" they are to each other. Nevertheless, the High Court, while accepting that Ma and Pa Waters were merely Aussies passing through Canada for a few months, ruled that Ms Waters was unlawfully sitting in Parliament. Incidentally, this means also that her votes were unlawful.
On the other hand, the High Court acquitted one of her fellow semi-aliens because, although his dad was born in British Cyprus, Nick Xenophon is merely a British Overseas Citizen, which status confers no right of abode in the United Kingdom:
A person who is registered as a BOC is not required to pledge loyalty to the United Kingdom. This is by way of contrast with the pledge that is required of a person who is registered as a British citizen. Mr Fransman considers that a BOC does not owe loyalty to the United Kingdom per se but that he or she does owe loyalty or allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen. He does not express a concluded view on whether the allegiance is owed to Her Majesty at large or to Her Majesty in right of the United Kingdom, although he inclines to the latter view. The position with respect to Senator Xenophon is less clear in light of a change in practice. Mr Fransman assumes that the duty of loyalty of a person who became a BOC by reclassification on 1 January 1983, as Senator Xenophon did, is the same as the duty of loyalty of a person who registered as a BOC under the BNA 1981. Mr Fransman considers that, while today an Australian citizen registering as a BOC would be required to take an oath to Her Majesty in right of the United Kingdom, under previous practice this would not have been required because an Australian was already a citizen of a country of which the Queen was Head of State. While the date of the change in practice is not stated, as at the date Senator Xenophon was reclassified it appears that had he applied to be registered as a BOC he would not have been required to take an oath of allegiance to Her Majesty the Queen in right of the United Kingdom.
Is this beginning to sound to you like bollocks on stilts? In breezily redefining Section 44 to mean a citizenship that was invented half-a-century after the law was written and whose anomalies and ambiguities persisted for another third-of-a-century after that, the modern High Court was engaging in a characteristic bit of post-colonial hyper-nationalism that has had the paradoxical effect of forcing not only the judges but the entire Australian political system to swear "allegiance to a foreign power". It's like instituting Nuremberg racial purity laws and then outsourcing their administration to random bureaucrats around the planet. As the contrasting treatments of Ms Waters and Mr Xenophon demonstrate, non-Australian laws now get to determine whether you're eligible to sit in the Australian Parliament: If Canada were to introduce the category of "Canadian Overseas Citizen" and "reclassify" Ms Waters, why, her tenure in Canberra might be retrospectively legitimized. Conversely, if the United Kingdom were to re-reclassify Mr Xenophon (as it did for example citizens of dependent territories in 2002 when it restored their right of abode in the UK), then he'd be liable to be kicked out all over again. Alternatively, Kim Jong-un could simply pronounce all seven billion people on the planet North Korean Overseas Citizens, and there'd be no one on earth allowed to stand for election in Australia. Go for it, Rocketman!
As for Barnaby Joyce, perhaps the easiest solution would be for him to move to London, where, as an Australian or a New Zealander or both, he's eligible to stand for the British Parliament. Through the long years of Euro-tyranny, that seemed like a quaint imperial anachronism. But, in fact, it's less insane than the Australian High Court's micro-management of the subtleties of allegiance of "British Overseas Citizens". In the UK, Commonwealth citizens are not in law "aliens". Whereas in Australia everyone's a potential alien mainly in the sense of that John Hurt chestburster scene in which you can be as Aussie as can be chugging along all ticketty-boo and then some creepy Welsh midget great-uncle bursts through your rib cage and leaps out.
In this absurd controversy, you find the same reality-denying psychosis of the US Diversity Lottery, under which this week's Bike Path Jihadist and 23 of his family were admitted to the United States because, for all its vibrant diversity, America was perceived to be coming up short on Uzbeks. There are some 200 countries in the world, and in the west we are no longer allowed to distinguish between them: So, for example, Sweden is supposed to pretend that Somalis and Afghans are no harder to assimilate than Finns and Danes, and likewise Australians are supposed to pretend that entirely notional New Zealanders in the Senate men's room are more foreign than eager decapitators of the new Caliphate in Sydney suburbs.
Repeal Section 44 [clarification: by referendum] and end this perverted casuistry. Or do as Tony Benn did when his viscountcy made him ineligible for the House of Commons: stand, and stand again, and make the issue one of the law's subversion of the people's choice. If that's not too "foreign" an analogy...
UPDATE! Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg is worried he might be accidentally Hungarian. So the insanity continues: You don't have to be Magyar to work here, but it helps...
~We welcome divided allegiances in The Mark Steyn Club, so if you're a member of the Steyn Club from Down Under feel free to have at it in our comments section. If you're not a Club member but you'd like to be, it involves a simple renunciation of your existing citizenship and confers a right of abode in Chad: you can sign up for a full year, or, lest you suspect a dubious scam by a fly-by-night Canuck scamster, merely a quarter. Aside from our monthly radio serials, we have a quarterly newsletter, The Clubbable Steyn; some rip-roaring video poetry; and our Clubland Q&As. More details here - and don't forget our new Gift Membership.
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65 Member Comments
Is there no end to judicial lunacy? Has this state of affairs always been present? When I was a mere youth I thought grownups knew what they they were doing. Now it seems all is an insane asylum.
Obama may be surprised to learn he's a subject of the British Crown.
Mark replies:
Indeed. Like Mr Xenophon, he is a British Overseas Citizen.
I've been following this slow motion train wreck for a while now. As an Aussie about to return home soon after the better part of a decade wandering the world, this and the SSM debate have me wondering what I am going home to.
I was starting to think maybe I should just park up on top of Ayers Rock (sorry, Uluru) and ignore the rest of the world - but apparently that's off the menu as well.
The only thing that comes close to giving me a chuckle these days is the assumption from (Aus) friends that I must be leaving because of Trump.
Hello, Mark
Clearly, the Australian High Court's understanding of foot-shooting is deficient. If, after an attempt, there are vestiges of toes remaing, the correct procedure is to switch to a larger-calibre howitzer. Repeat the process until all vestiges of toes are gone.
It would be hard to create a more perfect analogy for the intellectual bankruptcy of today's elites than this story. A drop of British blood is more dangerous than the dedicating the entire amount to Islam, apparently.
Indeed. Strange to say the least. The last time I checked, the Australian flag carries the Union Jack and it's Head of State is Queen Elizabeth II, Head of the Commonwealth of which Australia is a member. I'm struggling to understand why any feeling of allegiance to Blighty should pose any strategic threat to Oz! It seems that country is regressing into a sort of legalistic absurdity where strict law trumps meaning.
The elite making the rules themselves, bypassing the electorate, with absolutely no regard for consequences in the real world. Similar to the Victorian Supreme Court decision in a "human rights" case that the Federal Government pay $70 million compensation to illegal immigrants on Manus Island. (Hey, that's our taxes you know!) Excellent article, Mark. Kiwis are our cousins.
RE: "Alternatively, Kim Jong-un could simply pronounce all seven billion people on the planet North Korean Overseas Citizens, and there'd be no one on earth allowed to stand for election in Australia. Go for it, Rocketman!"
The way I understand it, Rocketman Un does not need to do that. He can save his rockets and bring the Australian government to its knees simply by issuing DPRK passports to every Member of Parliament.
The legal contortions that the Australian Court have come up with make this subject far too ridiculous for me to have a comment on the matter.
This is precisely why Monty Python's Flying Circus was funny way back when as it skewered political bureaucracy. The ridiculous issues, parried about in complete earnestness, are totally believable. Thanks for the laughs, though it's not so funny if you're from Oz.
Don't forget Yes, Minister and Yes, Prime Minister.
Meanwhile, in the northern hemisphere the U.S. Second Circuit Court of Appeals just issued and emergency stay in the case of Ezekiel Elliott. Who is Ezekiel Elliott you might ask? Well, he's the star running back for the NFL's Dallas Cowboys. It seems that Mr. Elliott had some off field issues with a former girlfriend, precipitating a six game suspension from the League. Not willing to take this lying down, the NFL Players' Association sued in Federal Court to block the suspension. After issuing a temporary stay District Court Judge Katherine Failla declined to strike down the suspension, meaning Mr. Elliott would have to start serving the suspension. So, of course Mr. Elliott appealed to the Second Circuit Court of Appeals to get an emergency stay of Judge Failla's order, which the Court issued. Apparently a panel will hear the case next Monday to see if they should issue an injunction to overturn Judge Failla's order.
Australian courts may get to decide who can and cannot sit in Parliament, but American courts get to decide who can and cannot play football! Never say that we Americans don't make good use of our judicial resources.
BTW Mark, don't you wish your case with Mann got this kind of expedited treatment?
G'day Forum Friends,
Friday morning here in mid-continent USA and my day began with a reading and re-reading of Mark's commentary. First blush - made no sense. Second time 'round, sorta kinda got it.
For anyone who gives a rat's patoot - I am one of those who refrains from critical commentary regarding someone else's country. The exception is only when that country is an enemy of mine - then, Katy bar the door.
If the Aussies wish to delineate who is and who is not a bona fide citizen eligible for public office holding - so be it. Not for this Yank to say. But I will say that the commentary from those who know far more than I on the subject matter has been interesting and enlightening.
Back in another chapter of my long life I was a radio-telegraph operator/technician and cryptographer in one of my country's armed forces. I was approaching a decision-point in my life where remaining "in" or "getting out" was paramount on my mind.
On our bulletin board at the communications center where I was assigned there appeared a notice from the Australian government. It was a solicitation for the recruitment of U.S. military personnel possessing the skills I had been practicing for 5 years. Interested persons were to apply in person at the AustralIan Consulate in NYCity. I did.
The "deal" was for a one-year assignment for work in Australia for the government; not the military. Passage to down under would be by ship with a return passage included, if desired. If after one year of employment the selectee wished to remain in Australia, an application for citizenship had to be approved with renunciation of U.S. citizenship required. The latter did it for me. It was a "no go."
To this day, I wished that the requirements had permitted me to keep my U.S. citizenship, for that adventure held so much appeal. However, I respected then and still hold true to my contention that it is the right of any sovereign state to create and hold to the requirements for citizenship (and all that it brings) as they wish.
Interesting subject.
Tom in Missouri
A dreamers dreams dashed on the hard rock of sovereignty. Today, we let dreamers in and thank them for coming -- No Allegiance Expected or Required! I've heard you can even desert the armed forces, wreak mayhem, be feted at the WH, all whilst avoiding hard time -- but this can't possibly be true... can it?
One day in the revised world English dictionary, words like sovereignty and allegiance will disappear into the abyss.
For what it is worth, I know one of the chief defenders of the deserter - happened to be a legal advisor for my team's maritime law enforcement efforts in the mid-Atlantic during the mid-70's. One day a prosecutor, the next a defender. 'round and 'round she goes - where she stops, who the hell knows?
Tom in Missouri
You're braver than me, Tom. I don't think I could tackle a second go round of that story, especially after reading through all the comments which didn't provide much more elucidation of the topic. I think I prefer to spend the rest of the day on the real interesting problem of the global warming that's happening on Venus. There's a real imbalance going on there that not too many people are taking seriously, unlike here on Earth where it seems the climate is doing just fine and the inhabitants are the ones who have lost all semblance of balance. There was a suggestion from a club member around the time of Harvey Weinstein's coming on potted plants that we would remove all the detritus in the political and sexual deviant category of inhabitants and start rocketing them off to Venus. Now where will they go?
Fran,
I have found that as age takes its toll, my interests in this 'n that have increased. Have no clue as to why, but thanks to you, I now will have to delve into the global warming on Venus!
Then again, my intergalactic interests would have it that any rocket with me aboard would have to be heading to a planet where the gals have arms!. Ooooooops, there goes "that" mind of mine (again).
With regard to why this thread exists: It is an interesting and challenging topic for many of us who are unfamiliar with the goings-on in governments elsewhere. Thanks in large measure to Mark's Saturday Clubland Q&A catch-up, I found things not so confusing . . .
As stated in my initial commentary on this thread: when it comes to my oh-pin-yun regarding someone else's country, et al - unless they are out to do my kind "in," then I refrain from being critical. Hell, there's plenty of room for that right here in the U.S. of A. But, when outsiders throw in their 2-cents, it does bother me a bit.
Weinstein, in his next life, will reappear as a cactus, somewhere out your way in the desert southwest.
Cheers!
Tom in Missouri
I have to agree with you, Tom, that if the discussion is about another country, I'll do everyone a favor and be an observer. It just seems like a very illogical kind of story and I do better with logical trains of thought. This one had me going bonkers.
Question! I see a lot of other posts using links. Can you set me straight or think you that I should submit the question to the Club Grand Poobah? Is it permissible to use other links to websites as long as they're not news publications or personal sites for profit?
Fran,
With regard to links: Have you ever experienced that "Now, where did I put the car keys (substitute: eye glasses)? Well, I know I read that the use of URL's (links) are discouraged, but for the life of me cannot relocate that reference!
Anyway, I have seen several links within the commentaries - some absolutely necessary to support a point, others mere FYI. I suppose in absence of that "prohibition" I cannot find - it is up to the participant.
For me, I refrain from use with a rare exception here 'n there. I have owned more than one web site and managed a few others; links can be oh-so-distracting and wind up no more than a reading exercise; Snipe Hunt if you will.
Mark's elaborate and well-informed staff most assuredly will be able to handle your inquiry.
Tom in Missouri
P,S, Thanx for your Email regarding my web site; response sent.
Finally, had a chance to view all of the photos at your website, Tom. I see what I was doing wrong initially. I loved the Alaskan group probably the best, although you make the Trans Canadian train seem the must do thing. I know where to go to get my mini-escape until either the site is closed or I get to go on the real train rides in either location. I really hope the opportunity for others in the club to view these comes up. There's nothing as inspiring for me in photography as seeing the majestic snow covered jagged mountain peaks. I'm learning all about the various cloud formations in my atmospheric group, so the photography of the clouds above the Alaskan landscapes are quite the visual bonus. Many thanks for sharing this site of yours.
This should be saved as a wild card in case Elizabeth Warren gets too far in the 2020 US primaries.
These blokes in the Australian Parliament should invoke their ancient Anglo-Saxon right to trial by combat.
Usually in Britain, it's the Home Office that gets to reach decisions on these things (to be overturned, about eight years later, by a High Court judge, if the plaintiff is Afghan), but it's possible that the Foreign and Commonwealth Office was responsible in the case of Senator Parry. Either way, both departments of state have a knack of getting stuff wrong and I think one or other did this time, too.
As Mark Steyn said, the solution is in the hands of Australians and the problem really started there, as well, but Mark seems to have pondered the problem with a lot more clarity than anyone in Whitehall did. With a British-born father, Senator Parry would be entitled to claim UK citizenship, but to say that a person born in Australia is automatically a UK citizen, by virtue of his father's place of birth, is a bit of a stretch, to say the least. Supposing Senator Parry had tried to emigrate to the UK, I am pretty sure he would have been obliged to prove his eligibility, as an Australian-born friend of mine did. The cases are not identical, as her parents are both Australian, so she had to prove that all four of her grandparents were British-born. Somebody in the Home Office, in this case, really didn't want to let her stay. She did win, but they made her jump through hoops. And yet Senator Parry, without applying to be a UK citizen, gets to be one, regardless.
So, it seems Whitehall is happy to claim Aussies for Britain, as long as they stay in Australia.
This idiocy, as usual in the US too, is coming from oracular morons in robes. Who else could twist themselves into theoretical pretzels creating such a sophistic argument? A person who neither considers himself a citizen of another country, nor has taken any action indicating allegiance to any country but Australia; is nevertheless a citizen of the other country and not the one he to which claims true allegiance. It's ludicrous to issue this sort of farcical opinion under color of law. The justices might as well use rune stones or bones. That at least would represent a sort of intellectual honesty.
Too funny! One hopes that the so-called "Alt-Right" doesn't get too big a say in the future or a lot of Israeli-American dual citizens are going to get one-way tickets to an airport in Tel-Aviv.
Agree with Mark that it's complete bollocks.... and with others (fellow countrymen) that it's bollocks they should've checked up on! That seems to be why people are quite ambivalent about the whole thing. Barnaby, for instance- going back a few months- said there was no way, NO WAY, he wasn't 100 percent Australian-owned; then looked a bit too shocked the day he found out he was also a Kiwi; then said he was confident about staying put until the High Court decision (and looked a bit sheepish); then said he wasn't at all surprised when the Court did NOT so hold (reverse paraphrasing Malcolm). And I say that at as someone who quite likes Barnaby (agrarian socialist that he is, notwithstanding). Perhaps the rest of us could be forgiven for not knowing, but if it's incumbent upon career politicians to check, then why didn't they? Preferably before collecting the salary, passing laws etc...
That said, Mark's point about "foreign allegiance" versus "dual citizenship" is well-taken; relevantly, Brandis chose to refer to the unsuitability of section 44 in terms of "multiculturalism" going forward, as opposed to historical ties within the Commonwealth (...as applied to the 5= 2 Brits, 1 Canadian, 2 Kiwis. I'm more worried about the fact that GB thinks any future "Australian" parliamentarian should have the right to wear certain head-to-toe religious garb into the chamber should she so choose. And the crying didn't help).
The Frydenberg fiasco proves how crazy it is; he's urgently engaged the services of an "investigator" in Budapest! As it was explained on radio this morning (from non-expert memory), it's all very complicated, as despite his Jewish mother being stateless according to existing Hungarian law at the time of her birth (which would neatly solve the current problem) her precise birthplace might turn out to be the key issue (... so decision may ultimately depend on annexed territory/ borders during collaboration). A rather extreme example of Mark's point that it's crazy that "... parliamentary eligibility (is) dependent on the whims of non-Australian laws."
Mark replies:
Exactly, Kate. In the 116 years since the birth of the Commonwealth of Australia, Hungary has lurched from the Habsburg Empire to the Horthy Regency to a Soviet satellite to a "Third Republic" with a zillion course corrections re citizenship and other matters en route. Why should eligibility to sit in the Australian Parliament be dependent on what is by comparison a totally unstable polity?
Perhaps you could fax a copy of your article to the High Court, Mark?
The vagaries of 20th century Hungarian irredentism etc etc may yet play a major role in the balance of power in Canberra in 2017!
As a dual citizen (with no parliamentary ambitions), I find it all very interesting given Ireland's non-too-distant history, and varying citizenship rules for foreign-born-nationals-by-descent.
PS. Kebab shop in Cairns- hilarious. Also the observation by Tim Blair.... Nick Xenophon's crime: being Nick Xenophon. Funny because it's true!
And in breaking news (Weekend Australian): "The Hungarian citizenship act of 1993 also states that "children born in Hungary of stateless persons residing in Hungary" are recognised as Hungarian citizens."
'Could this be one explanation?' —Jean Raspail
This is just another example of a nation in The West piddling and diddling around in Absurd areas of trivialities that end-up undermining their Legitimacy, while it's enemies score victory after victory in things that really matter.
The West, I've concluded, doesn't deserve to survive in it's present form — and it won't anyway because it refuses to stop it's obsessive desire to destroy itself.
We have to start preparing to form Islands Of Refuge where the Idea of The West survives [most especially the Anglo variety, which is the pinnacle of it].
We have to become, it seems sadly, like the Early Christians before Constantine The Great — perhaps practicing our rituals in figurative catacombs.
If the trend we are seeing towards Decentralization continues, this would be an advantage to us, The Remnant [one can perceive a possible Neo-Feudalism emerging, but this is a topic for another time]. In the breakdown of the Nation-State and the re-rise of a modern version of the Medieval City-State, we may be able to carve-out some defendable territories.
However this drawn-out Suicide by The West plays out, we owe it to our Posterity to preserve what our Ancestors fought hard — and suffered, often horribly — to gift to us. That is our Obligation and Duty if we are to dare call ourselves Virtuous, if we are to dare to hope that Divine Providence will shine on us once again.
Refugium inveniemus in provinciis!
"This is just another example of a nation in The West piddling and diddling around in Absurd areas of trivialities that end-up undermining their Legitimacy, while it's enemies score victory after victory in things that really matter."
Well said. Those with a real allegiance to a dangerous foreign power (ISIS) are allowed to live among us.
The self-destructive obsession with trivialities by the HC-- identifying parliamentarians with a "foreign allegiance", of which none were consciously aware-- merely proves that "... it's the vibe of the thing" is an entirely reasonable legal argument as far as Section 44 is concerned. Media demands today for parliamentarians to demonstrate "undivided national loyalty" through a rigorous audit process; seems it's been forgotten that Senator Dastyari- despite renouncing Iranian citizenship- still had his bills paid by the Chinese in exchange for influencing South China Sea policy.
Whether or not the Court correctly interpreted and applied section 44, in my view this whole thing seems kind of silly. So what if some Australian citizen has a legacy right to citizenship in another country? Why is that an indicia of disloyalty to the country where he or she was born and raised? If it is such an indicia of disloyalty, then why is it so easy to cure through the relatively simply process of renouncing said legacy right of citizenship? Does having loyalty to or being in league with a foreign power really require one to be a card carrying citizen, or potential card carrying citizen, of that power? Personally, I don't think so. I don't think ISIS has progressed to the point that they're issuing passports.
The U.S. Constitution has a citizenship test for only one position, that of President. And even at that, we don't look back to what citizenship your parents might have previously held, so long as you were born a U.S. citizen. While I'm no fan of birthright citizenship, it at least makes a lot more sense than the bureaucratized loyalty test the Australians use.
Actually, I think for Australia an even more relevant example than North Korean global annexation- though plausible- is the issue of the establishment of an IS South East Asian caliphate (as it recedes elsewhere). We're sending troops to Marawi. We have the world's most populous Muslim nation on our doorstep. SSM is definitely not being debated in Aceh. Unless on rooftops.
Btw, do you recall the Australian medic (from Adelaide) who freely offered to relinquish his Australian citizenship- in fact taunted authorities over the matter- after joining ISIS, having acquired "new" citizenship? More to the point, given that innocent Jews were once deemed to be stateless, then why not Jihadists who've claimed allegiance to a "state"? Why should it be that dual-citizen jihadists can be potentially prevented from re-entering the country, by the "true Aussies" get to return? A completely arbitrary counter-terrorism measure, in many respects.
I do remember my dad back in 81 wished to go back to visit and old aunt and see old blighty fir one last time. When he applied for his passport to be reissued to him he went absolutely berserk at the passport office when he discovered he was now an 'Australian citizen'. He told them in no uncertain terms " I am a subject of the British commonwealth and I wish my documents to refer to me as such as they have done since 1939!" He was not impressed.
I desperately desperately want to stand for the Australian federal parliament but I realise I can't because my great great grandfather was born in Bolton Lancashire in 1817 and migrated to Australia in feb 1837. So frustrating.
But you make too much sense for our esteemed judiciary system here, Mark. I was born a couple of years before the official collapse of Yugoslavia, which ought to mean I'm a citizen of a country that no longer exists (but a proud Aussie citizen) I wonder what would happen to me if I were to have the sadistic inclination of entering Australian politics.
Dear Mark,
I'm afraid I have to agree with Richard Harrison: it's not absurd or bollocks on stilts. Your dissection of Section 44 is entirely accurate (and I proffer this opinion as a qualified nutritionist), but Australian parliamentarians should be Australian citizens and Australian citizens only. I hold dual British and Australian citizenships (and am eligible for Irish and Israeli citizenship as well; and, if I marry my squeeze of the last four years, as I would like to, American citizenship too), but I have no intention of going into politics.
Personally, I am delighted that "Watermelon" party co-deputy leader, Larissa Waters, has to vacate her senatorial office. As does the other "Watermelon" party co-deputy leader, a bloke who holds Italian citizenship. He owes the Australian exchequer $1.6M because he knew he was legally ineligible to run for a parliamentary office when he ran many years ago.
The deeper backstory to this saga was that in the 1980's the "Nuclear Disarmament Party" - dominated by former members of the Australian Communist Party (Moscow Alignment), Australian Communist Party (Peking Alignment), the People's Front of Judea, the Judean People's Front, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Judea and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Judea (General Command) - put forward a Senatorial candidate who was not an Australian citizen. He won, well knowing that he was constitutionally ineligible to run for such office. And was obliged to resign a few months later when his lack of Australian citizenship was exposed. His first act whilst in office was to appoint his boyfriend as his Chief of Staff so that their household had two breadwinners; both with their snouts in the public trough.
So this is a sensitive issue for Ozzies. We don't want parliamentarians who can run off to, say, Lebanon - with which Australia has no extradition treaty - when they are caught taking bribes and have dual Lebanese-Australian citizenship.
You are not remotely responding to the points made in the article. How is Lebanon relevant? Mark Steyn speaks about Australians who have been accused of being British, Kiwi, Scottish (still British, the last time I was there) and Canadian. What earthly relevance has Lebanon to that?
Well cor blimey guvneh is all I can say to all this malarkey.
The financial benefits for serving and retired Australian politicians are among the most generous in the world. (Far too generous actually). So its a small ask that they complete some basic paperwork before planting their backsides into plush leather seats and jacking up the red-tape for the rest of us. Most of them are career politicians by the way, so they have had years to figure this out. I get Marks point, it does seem silly, but at the moment its the law and these guys and girls knew it. They just chose to ignore it.
This story is like one of my tangled up skeins of wool the cat got into. I did get the first 17 words though. G'day and good luck to the Ozzie contingent. Me just a dumb dingleberry.
I'm with you Mark. This entire debacle is ridiculous, and any conservative thinking its a good thing is being played big time.
I just did a quick look at the birth place of all of our Governor-Generals. What a surprise, only 11 of the 26 were even born in Australia. Who could also forget our longest serving Prime Minister declaring himself 'British to his bootstraps'. I guess the lot of them should have been turfed out too.
You hit the nail on the head by identifying what a 'foreign power' is. That would be China. Or Indonesia. I am indeed Australian, but you as a Canadian are family. Its impossible for you to be a 'foreigner' to me - even though I have never once set foot in Canada. Likewise NZ.
We 'Lion Cubs' as you affectionately refer to us, are British. Perhaps we are no longer almost exclusively ethnically so, but the vast majority still are to be sure. Those from other lands who have moved to our nations since the 1950/60's by default have adopted the political, economic and cultural customs of Britain whether they realise it or not.
One of the lefts greatest feats has been to unmoor the Lion Cubs from Great Britain. Most Australians if asked to reflect on the experiences of both world wars, instinctively think of the ANZACS, and never as the AIF (Australian Imperial Forces) fighting side by side with our kin from all the Commonwealth.
I think this is a deliberate tactic. Break down what it means to be part of the great British family of nations. Then once in a smaller, isolated state (literally), proceed to break down what it means to be an 'Aussie' or 'Kiwi' to suit the new imported demographic.
As you like to point out Mark, our nations are some of the oldest in the world in a Constitutional sense, yet we are fed the line that we are 'new' countries without much history etc. The history of our ancestors began in 1788, meaning everyone from say Alfred the Great onwards was just some story for a 'foreign country' that has nothing to do with us, rather than recognising that he is just as much a 'Canadian' hero as English.
From there, its a far more simple task to change entirely what an 'Aussie'. Afterall, we are just a 'young' country with no history or culture. So hey, why not embrace 'diversity' and 'rich' culture that our new demographic brings.
Many Australians (perhaps most) would regard Kiwis, Brits and Canadians as their cousins, and not as foreigners.
But a set of Acts of Parliament (the Australia Acts) in 1986 ended the last vestiges of British legal authority over Australia. In 1999 the High Court of Australia found that those Acts had the effect (inter alia) of rendering the Queen of the United Kingdom (and the Queen of New Zealand and the Queen of Canada) "foreign powers" so far as Australian citizens are concerned - notwithstanding that Her Majesty holds those titles in addition to her title as Queen of Australia.
So, regardless of the strong emotional and cultural ties between those countries and Australia, legally they are now foreign powers, and the Australian constitution states that anyone who has allegiance to a foreign power is ineligible to be a member of the Australian Parliament.
It might be a shame, and it might be worth considering reversing, but it is not "absurd" or "bollocks on stilts". It's simply a consequence of the weakening of ties between Australia and the United Kingdom and her empire.
All well and good, but an act doesn't erase all heritage and links to the past, nor should it. An act might codify new relationships of a changed world with an eye to the future, but a new law isn't a sweep of a magic wand that alters the facts of history. Allegiance to a foreign power and quaint, vestigial notional citizenship are very different.
The relevant section does say "...or is a subject or a citizen or entitled to the rights or privileges of a subject or citizen of a foreign power..."
But firstly, quoting me in the body of your essay is a true honour, and I mean that sincerely. So let me repost here what I added to your rebuttal of my original post in the preceding piece you quote me from:
Well I accept your reasoning on original intent. However, there is such a thing as Australian citizenship now, and if you hold dual citizenship, then you clearly have the ability to show allegiance to a foreign power, whether or not you do is not the point. The mechanism via dual nationality to do so is there. Also, to their credit, our High Court always takes a conservative approach to matters of elections and electoral legitimacy - when in doubt, they toss the result out. That's a good thing. It ultimately gives power back to the people. In this case, the House of Representatives members will go to fresh elections; the senators will be replaced by another person from the party that won the seat, so in either case, the will of the people will be respected.
The only thing I would add today to my bit from yesterday is "they are all bums, kick them all out."
"Foreign power" - Mark addressed this two days ago and in the above article - the vast difference between allegiance to a foreign power and notional citizenship.
Yep, and his point is understood. Nevertheless, respect for sovereignty, borders, the nation state, does mean that even members of the Commonwealth are foreign powers to each other. Not hostile foreign powers, if we're talking Australia, New Zealand, Canada, UK, but foreign powers nonetheless. Even if you fully accept Mark's reasoning, I don't see this decision as a bad one. It's erring on the side of caution. And here's the ultimate reason most people in Oz support this decision - they can see that the establishment swamp, even if dinky di Aussie through and through, cares more about globaliam than Australia, so it doesn't take obscure foreign citizenship to make Aussie taxpayers doubt their loyalty to us. There is not much sympathy there.
"...and if you hold dual citizenship, then you clearly have the ability to show allegiance to a foreign power, whether or not you do is not the point. "
That's reminiscent of the concept of "pre-crime" as in the Minority Report. Then again, the "ability" to show allegiance to a foreign power isn't the preserve of dual citizens. Kim Philby and the other Cambridge spies didn't originally hold Russian or Soviet citizenship. They liked that style and exercised their ability to prefer that allegiance over that to their own country with grave consequences for those they betrayed. The Soviet Union eventually rewarded them with citizenship. Seems to be universal this ability to show allegiance to a foreign power.
Surely a dual citizenship only creates "the ability to show allegiance to a foreign power" (whatever that phrase means) if one is aware that such dual citizenship exists?
Yes, every person on earth possesses the "ability" to show allegiance to a foreign power.... Thus under Aussie's jurisprudence no one is eligible to serve in the Australian government....
I agree it can get murky and muddy with other nations' laws, but if you renounce all ties to any potential foreign nation and pledge allegiance to Australia, that's a pretty simple thing to do. The government could pass a law making it mandatory for anyone seeking election to swear to an affidavit with similar language, for example.
Mark replies:
Every Australian Member of Parliament, in order to take his seat, has to declare "I [Your Name Here] do swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth the Second, Her heirs and successors according to law. So help me God" - which ought to cover it until Malcolm gets his republic, although even that's kinda covered by the "successors according to law" bit.
Yes. And anyway, where's the collusion?!
Good point. In order to sue in court, an "injury" must have occurred. It can't just be hypothetical. This also has the feel of a court "discovering" something that was not there originally.
Indeeed, they do swear allegience to Betty Windsor et al...rather than Australia.
Hunh, and I thought it was the US Constitution that was a suicide pact.
According to the left, even the Bible is a suicide pact. We are supposed to love our neighbor ... to death.
Well done Mark, a logical and just interpretation of the Australian Constitution. The seven learned justices have embarrassed themselves and Australia with their navel gazing, pontificating and, frankly, silly judgement.
Is this is the best legal judgment Australians can expect from the Supreme Court? The law is an ass once again.
Hmm. Very peculiar.
Australia might want to soberly heed the caution/lessons learned from West Africa's Ivory Coast's political conniving debacle of the decade of 2000. It started after Laurence Gbagbo who won the election by out-maneuvering General Guy who was trying to regularize his position as military-post-mutiny-turned ad-hoc coup leader after the sitting president Bedie fled to French shelter (appealing to French dual citizenship) , by being elected president. Ominously, not long after General Guy and his wife were murdered. In the next election, challenged by the former Vice President, Allassan Outtara, Gbagbo and his socialist political party came up with a unique solution to bar Outtara from running: disqualifying the former Vice President by asserting Outtara didn't qualify as a citizen... not anymore evidently.
They first passed a new law that stated to be an Ivorian citizen and thus eligible to run for president, one had to be born in Ivory Coast to both Ivorian parents who needed the same qualifications. This was quite draconian for West Africa as many families and thus blood-linked tribes are spread across multiple countries. This instantly disqualified the first president of Ivory Coast's own children as their mother was Senegalese. Outtara's extended family is blood-linked to families in neighboring Burkina Faso, a part of which was carved from what is now Ivory Coast.
Step two was to declare that Outtara wasn't actually Ivorian due to being born in the 'north' a once-disputed line town of Bouake (which is halfway from the capital to the Burkina Faso border) and that he'd used Burkina Faso passport when he was a student. To press the point, Gbagbo's government announced that pretty much anyone north of Bouake had their citizenship revoked - or something like had to be each painstakingly re-submitted for approval. In tunnel vision to lock out Outtara and his large voting bloc, in one stroke, they'd 100% disenfranchised the entire northern half of the country, including half of the military - a rather large population that suddenly were stateless. A military mutiny ensued. Why not? Half the military, enlisted and officers absolutely had nothing to lose, they'd been stolen of their citizenship and they took the arsenals with them.
The French rushed to intervene - to stop the bullets flying along the fracture line that ran right through Bouake, cutting the country in half, and rushed to squash everything ASAP by brokering a peace treaty, which by southern interpretations, sold out the south for the north and got most of the French, some of who had been there for generations, born and raised in Ivory Coast, beaten out of the country by the outraged southerners.
After several years of a physically-divided country with a demilitarized zone cutting it in half, being shut out for president a second time, then running a military campaign and securing UN support that he had indeed won election, Outtarra usurped Gbabgo and is currently president of Ivory Coast.
There is a lot of incompetent politics in this much more complicated story - and a lot more death, human tragedy, disruption, social animosity and massive economic losses caused by it - than presented, but one key issue that underlines all of it - the northern half of Ivory Coast is majority Muslim, the southern half majority Catholic/Christian and animist. Outtara with a bigger voting base than the other political tribal leaders had many valid legal reasons to protest the ham-fisted scheme to deny him through the political process; Gbabgo was more atheistic/progressive socialist thug, not liked outside of his own tribal political group, but the gut worry of the south was not to have a Muslim-dominated government. With outside intervention to put a 'justifiable' finger on the scales...
Now, what's going on in Australia besides what appears on the apparently-bizarre surface?
Has anyone subjected the members of the High Court to the same scrutiny? No, wait, I'm sure it doesn't apply to them.
I lapsed into the voice of Ben Stein reading para. 94 and 95 and found the cure for insomnia.
Enlightening. As a Californian, I sometimes think that in order to avail myself fully of all the rights and privileges one expects as a freeborn, independent and sovereign citizen unencumbered by the strictures of an overbearing state, I will someday find myself declaring to the authorities, "No hablo inglés." Then, the glorious and shining hope of all tomorrows, shall be mine.
I understand that you take exception to this issue Mark. However, as an Australian I think they all deserved what they are getting as it shows clearly that not one of them took the time to read the bloody constitution before they decided to run for office. If you can't be blowed reading the foundation document of the institution that you are going to drawing a wage/pension for life from and think you can tiptoe around with some fancy pants lawyering then good riddance. What else do you think you can get away with? I really don't see this as a big ask from all of the major parties - some kind of basic checklist before you even run for god's sake. Naw, don't bother with that tiresome document - let's just ignore it as everyone else has yeah? Wink wink! Nudge nudge etc etc. You are wrong on this one champ.
Robert, I don't know if you saw it, but - and the entry above notwithstanding - in a different post a couple days ago, Mark made a fine distinction between allegiance to a foreign power and notional citizenship, a distinction that makes all the difference.
Steyn incoming in 3, 2, 1...
In America, most people who cry "the Constitution!" are flakes. It appears to me that Mr. Steyn has adequately addressed the Australian Constitutional issue, and found there to be no countenance for the actions taken in its name.
Most Australians think this is a big nothing for the very reasons Mark set out.