Barnaby who?
Posted on 10/26/2017 11:26:12 PM PDT by naturalman1975
The Turnbull Government has lost its one-seat majority after the High Court ruled Barnaby Joyce's election invalid because of his New Zealand citizenship.
Mr Joyce will now face a by-election. The court also found former Greens senators Scott Ludlam and Larissa Waters were not validly elected, along with One Nation's Malcolm Roberts and the National Party's Fiona Nash.
(Excerpt) Read more at abc.net.au ...
Five of the seven have now been formally disqualified including the Deputy Prime Minister after the High Court considered the issues.
Two have avoided disqualification - Matt Canavan who apparently might have become an Italian citizen when his mother applied for dual citizenship for herself, and had no knowledge that that was even possible and made no application himself, and Nick Xenophon, who may have technically had a very unusual form of British citizenship which gives him no actual rights as a British citizen but could demonstrate he had made reasonable steps to renounce any previous citizenships before entering Parliament. Xenophon had already announced he was leaving Parliament to go back to state level government anyway (he's a very real power in his own state).
The loss of the Deputy Prime Minister means the government has lost its absolute majority, but should hold onto government for the moment as the Labor opposition still has less members and enough of the crossbench (non government/non opposition MPs - minor party representatives and independents basically) are willing to keep the government in power for now.
It is a shame that judge didn’t rule on Obama’s citizenship.
The Turnbull Government has lost its one-seat majority after the High Court ruled Barnaby Joyce's election invalid because of his New Zealand citizenship. Mr Joyce will now face a by-election. The court also found former Greens senators Scott Ludlam and Larissa Waters were not validly elected, along with One Nation's Malcolm Roberts and the National Party's Fiona Nash.
Whats up Fred. The judiciary in Australia is really enforcing the Constitution!
Are they making sure that Muslims will not be elected representatives if they have dual citizenship in OZ and say, Pakistan?
I am surprised by the ruling, in Joyce’s case. It was a decision by the NZ govt to award citizenship to descendants of citizens - how could he have known? And his father lived during the time when there was an entirely different citizenship structure in the Commonwealth. This NZ thing looks like a residual right, rather than a proper citizenship.
A big part of the problem seems to be that New Zealand has started interpreting its own laws differently, so anybody with a right to be a New Zealand citizen is a New Zealand citizen by default.
Let’s cut through the garbage about so called “dual citizenship”...
I was born British, registered as a New Zealand citizen at age one month, but in 1975 I had to renounce my New Zealand citizenship if I wanted to be naturalized as an American citizen...
I raised my right hand and said the words “I renounce...”
If I had not done so, I would not have been allowed to participate in the naturalization ceremony...this was a requirement and part of the process...
There was no so called “dual citizenship” in 1975...
That meant all ties to New Zealand were severed and New Zealand was no longer responsible for me, an NZ citizen in a foreign country...(and I could no longer vote in NZ and now needed a passport to visit the land of my birth Plus healthcare was no longer free for me)
Now if there was a change in the American immigration etc laws since then, someone comment with proof and not just a story about some man you know etc...
The thing is, Australian law does recognise dual citizenship and has ever since the late 1940s when Australian citizenship first came into existence. Australia does not require a person to renounce foreign citizenships and it doesn’t happen automatically on becoming an Australian citizen.
You can lose a foreign citizenship if that country’s own laws extinguish your citizenship on becoming an Australian citizen. But Australian law will not deprive you of it.
You can renounce it - but the problem in all these cases is for various reasons, most of the people were unaware they even had a foreign citizenship. A couple of them probably should have been aware (if you were born overseas the possibility should certainly have occurred to you) but for the others - it’s more a matter of other countries giving out citizenship very easily to descendants of people from their countries.
Big difference. None of them have a forged birth certificate and all of them can tell us who there parents are and where they were born.
One problem with the gentleman whose father had connections to NZ is that both NZers and Aussies could just go back and forth without a passport...and work in the other country...
It was just like going to another state, here...
The fact that he didn’t know is feasible...
is there any update on this situation?
Labor refuse to release citizenship documents for MPs facing questions
By political reporters Matthew Doran and Ashlynne McGhee
Updated 21 Aug 2017, 11:29pm
Questions over citizenship a distraction: Shorten
Earlier, Opposition Leader Bill Shorten labelled reports he too may be a dual citizen as an attempt by the Coalition to distract from the farcical state of Federal Parliament.
“I’m fully aware that the Government is desperately trying to peddle its newest conspiracy that I’m a secret English agent,” Mr Shorten said.
“I renounced my citizenship in 2006, and there’s no whiff of evidence of anything to the contrary.”
On the ABC’s Q&A program on Monday night, he resisted calls to produce evidence he was not a dual citizen.
.....
It’s that old ‘one rule for thee and one rule for me’ in action.
Barnaby who?
Man behind citizenship scandal speaks out
The man who set in motion the Australian citizenship scandal that has now claimed five political careers says he expects more heads will roll.
West Australian Lawyer John Cameron ousted Greens MP Scott Ludlam as a New Zealand citizen in July this year, leading to an eventual constitutional crisis for the Australian government.
Senator Ludlam’s resignation resulted in the status of numerous other politicians being questioned, which culminated in Friday’s High Court Decision disqualifying five federal MPs.
In months that followed Senator Ludlam’s resignation Mr Cameron has kept his silence, but following the court’s decision has explained to AAP his motivation to dig into the background of Australia’s representatives.
Mr Cameron, who voted for Senator Ludlam, applied with the New Zealand Internal Affairs Department to search their register for the Greens senator, and found he was in fact a citizen.
From there he contacted the Australian Senate alerting them to the fact the he was a dual citizen, before contacting Senator Ludlam’s office.
While Mr Cameron said he was “invariably surprised” at how quickly the citizenship scandal had snowballed, he expects more politicians will fall foul of section 44 of the Australian constitution in coming months.
“There will be others,” Mr Cameron told AAP, just hours after the Australian High Court disqualified Mr Joyce and four other MPs on Friday afternoon.
“This opens up a huge can of worms,” he said from Perth.
Mr Cameron said that of the additional MPs he expected would lose their jobs, many would be British citizens.
While not religious, Mr Cameron said a prayer was his principal motivation to pursue to the citizenship story.
“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can and wisdom to know the difference.”
Mr Cameron said the prayer motivated him to make sure he would change what he could.
“There are those in Parliament who think that they are above the law. A correction is required,” he said.
The Perth based lawyer said he began digging in 2011, starting with then Prime Minister Julia Gillard and opposition leader Tony Abbott.
“When I started I was after Gillard and Abbott but I wasn’t having much joy getting the evidence; or I wasn’t getting much joy in the high court accepting the evidence that I had from the British border authority,” he said.
Instead Mr Cameron turned to his home country of New Zealand for information and the “low lying fruit” that was Senator Ludlam.
“So it was easier to go after Scott Ludlam as one of the low lying fruit because it was accessible through New Zealand,” he said.
Five months later, Mr Joyce, Senator Ludlam, Nationals MP Fiona Nash, One Nation Senator Malcolm Roberts and Greens Greens MP Larissa Waters have all been booted from office.
Mr Cameron said the citizenship scandal highlighted a need for a national anti-corruption commission, similar to what has been established in NSW.
“There’s a crying out need for an independent commission on corruption, as this case has demonstrated,” he said.
“And if nothing else comes out then it will have been worthwhile.”
Barrister who exposed Scott Ludlam says he was not politically motivated
Scott Ludlam is still a NZ citizen.
The Perth barrister who exposed former Greens Senator Scott Ludlam’s Kiwi citizenship said he was not politically motivated.
Dr John Cameron, a barrister at Francis Burt Chambers, said he applied three weeks ago to the New Zealand Department of Internal Affairs to search its register of citizens.
“I did this as a citizen, not as a lawyer, with a keen interest in the Constitution,” Dr Cameron, himself a dual citizen of both NZ and Australia, told The Weekend Australian.
“I checked about three weeks ago with the NZ Department of Internal Affairs and applied to search the register in relation to Mr Ludlam and Senator Hinch.
“I expected the human headline may not have done it and Mr Ludlam would have done it, but it was the other way around.
“I received the certificate for Mr Ludlam which showed he was still a citizen but for Mr Hinch the certificate shows that he renounced his citizenship before the last election.
“I sent the certificate to the clerk of the Senate, however out of a courtesy a few days ago I provided Senator Ludlam with a copy of the certificate. This is not driven by political ideology.”
On Friday, Mr Ludlam quit after accepting he had been ineligible to be a senator since his election in 2008.
Under Section 44 of the Constitution, politicians cannot hold “allegiance to a foreign power”.
Mr Ludlam, 47, left New Zealand as a three-year-old. He said he believed he automatically lost his NZ citizenship when he became an Australian in his teens.
Disability rights advocate Jordon Steele-John, 22, was the third Greens candidate on the ballot paper at last year’s Federal election and is expected to be Mr Ludlam’s successor.
Shorten himself has now tabled the evidence that he did renounce his British citizenship by descent shortly before he first ran for Parliament, so he's in the clear personally.
But there are a number of Labor MPs about whom legitimate questions have been raised who still have not done so, and the ALP is simply insisting that their own internal procedures mean they are in the clear and proof doesn't need to be presented.
I'll believe that when I see it and not a moment before...
I’d say that the law is a good one. No dual citizen Ozzie Muslims will be able to run for office.
You need to follow that those who were found to be in contravention of constitutional requirements, had no idea they held dual citizenship. The one who did know, resigned.
If you were to become naturalized in Canada for example, you might assume you were no longer an American citizen, right?
That’s what happened in several cases here. The member didn’t realize they had to rescind their nationality of birth, or the nationality of their parent’s citizenship.
Same applies to any muslim from anywhere.
I think.
All they have to do is renounce their other citizenship. It doesn't stop anybody.
The problem in this case is that most of the MPs and Senators involved did not know they had dual citizenship.
Scott Ludlam (Greens) moved to Australia from New Zealand as an infant. Became an Australian citizen in his teens and assumed this extinguished his New Zealand citizenship. He should have known better in my view - the fact he was born overseas should have made him aware the possibility existed he had dual citizenship. He has been ruled ineligible. Larissa Waters (Greens) moved to Australia from Canada as an infant. Canadian citizenship law changed a week after she was born. She was under the mistaken impression that older Canadian laws required her to register as a Canadian citizen in order to claim that citizenship. That was a mistaken assumption but a somewhat understandable one. She has been ruled ineligible.
Matthew Canavan (Liberal). Born in Australia, an Australian citizen since birth. There is some possibility he may have accidentally and unknowingly acquired Italian citizenship when his mother applied for and was granted such citizenship on her own behalf considerably after he had reached adulthood. He made no effort to apply for citizenship himself. The High Court has cleared him on the basis that it is unclear whether he acquired Italian citizenship, but even if he did, as he was an adult, his own knowledge and consent was required and was not present.
Nicholas Xenophon (Xenophon Team - basically an independent). Xenophon was born in Australia and has been an Australian citizen from birth. His father emigrated to Australia from Cyprus when Cyprus was still a British colony (it became independent shortly after Xenophon was born). Xenophon formally renounced any claim he had to Greek or Cypriot citizenship before he ran for Parliament but had no idea his father had retained and passed onto him, an unusual form of British Citizenship called British Overseas Citizenship. He has been cleared by the High Court because they have ruled British Overseas Citizenship is not actually a form of citizenship that bestows any real rights and so creates no conflict.
Barnaby Joyce (National - until yesterday, the Deputy Prime Minister). Born in Australia he has been an Australian Citizen since birth. His father was New Zealand born but emigrated to Australia before the concept of New Zealand citizenship even existed in law. His father was never aware he held any form of New Zealand citizenship, and Joyce was therefore unaware any possibility that he held such citizenship by descent applied. He has been disqualified.
Fiona Nash (National). Australian born, an Australian citizen since birth. Daughter of an immigrant from Scotland, she acquired British citizenship by descent. She probably should have been aware of this possibility. She has been disqualified.
Malcolm Roberts (One Nation). Born in India to a British father, the possibility he had Indian citizenship was originally raised. He didn't but he had acquired British citizenship by descent from his father. Malcolm Roberts knew he was a British citizen, but apparently believed - wrongly - that he lost this citizenship automatically when he was naturalised as an Australian citizen. His case was the weakest and he has been disqualified.
The OZ lesbian MP leftist Penny Wong apparently started this fiasco.
Deputy PM Barnaby Joyce will renounce his New Zealand Citizenship and will stand for re-election. Prediction is that he will w9in in a land slide.
The latest News is that even two Wongs won’t make a White.
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