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.
I’d say that the law is a good one. No dual citizen Ozzie Muslims will be able to run for office.