Australia: The complexities of citizenship (revocation debate)

Some of the Australian debate on the stated intent to expand citizenship revocation on security grounds by Clive Williams, an adjunct professor at Macquarie University’s Centre for Policing, Intelligence and Counter Terrorism:

Australian citizens by birth cannot currently have their Australian citizenship revoked. Similarly, those conferred with citizenship after fully disclosing all relevant factors cannot have their Australian citizenship revoked.

Under existing legislation, Australian citizenship can be revoked if it is deemed “contrary to the public interest for the person to remain an Australian citizen”. Such a general ground would seem difficult to enforce. Legislative reform would be needed to make it easier to remove citizenship on national security grounds. The UK, France and Canada already have legislation to strip citizenship from dual nationals considered to pose a national security threat.

Once dual nationals have had their Australian citizenship revoked and any appeal grounds considered they could be forcibly deported from Australia provided that did not place them at risk – in which case they would have to go into indefinite immigration detention or go somewhere that would accept them.

Looking at the case of our Islamic State foreign fighters, it seems likely that many would have become Australians by birth as second-generation migrants. Many are probably also dual nationals by dint of their parents’ country of origin. It would also be worth checking the background of any foreign fighter who gained dual Australian citizenship by application to see if there are reasonable grounds for citizenship cancellation.

Another option for the government is extending the cancellation of passports on security advice.

The complexities of citizenship.