New Aussie anti-Islamic party guns for 20 per cent of the vote

2015/08/04 Leave a comment

Australia’s newest political party:

Australia officially now has a political party modelled on the far-right wing movements in Europe and dedicated to the idea that Islam is a “totalitarian ideology with global aspirations”.

The Australian Liberty Alliance gained approval from the Australian Electoral Commission on Wednesday for registration as a party, having signed up well over the required 500 members and attracted no objections.

Its national secretary, Ralf Schumann, confirmed that controversial anti-Muslim Dutch politician Geert Wilders planned to launch the party on October 20.

Mr Schumann told sympathisers this week that the party faced “a strong headwind and … some nasty windshears”, but reminded supporters that “so did like-minded parties with similar policies in Europe”.

…Mr Schumann refused an interview about the party, which is the political offshoot of the “Islam-critical” Q Society. But Q Society national president Debbie Robinson, who is also a director of the ALA, told Fairfax Media that Islam was “a dangerous ideology that’s definitely not compatible with Western culture and society”.

“There is no moderate version of Islam … there may be people who don’t follow it to the letter, but there is no moderate version, so it’s dangerous. It’s dangerous for our society.”

In Q Society emails, Ms Robinson has said the Australian Liberty Alliance intends to “rebuild the lucky country”.

The party’s manifesto says “Our Australia stands for individual liberty, small government, Western values built on Judaeo-Christian and Humanistic foundations, social fairness and an integrated multi-ethnic society”.

It outlines a number of policy positions including “smarter, smaller government”, and “integration over separation” when it comes to multiculturalism.

Islam, the manifesto says, “uses the religious element as a means to project itself onto non-Islamic societies … No other religious ideology in our time has both the doctrinal aspiration as well as the economic and demographic muscle to impose itself globally”.

New Aussie anti-Islamic party guns for 20 per cent of the vote.

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“Reclaim Australia” – How racists are co-opting multiculturalism

2015/07/23 Leave a comment

Commentary by Ruby Hamad:

Even the name “Reclaim Australia” is a dead giveaway. Reclaim it for whom and from whom? Despite the nod to the “traditional owners”, they clearly they do no want to reclaim it for them. It’s about the ideals of whiteness.

As experts are now warning, we are going to see a lot more of this sort of thing in the future as our understanding of race and racism evolves.

When the dominance of the white race was indisputable and seemingly insurmountable, racism was simply about skin colour. Now, decades after the abolition of the White Australia policy, the civil rights movement in the US and the end of apartheid in South Africa, it’s about assimilation. Who is willing to play by the rules, to show us they are really “one of us”?

Islam is the primary target of Reclaim Australia not because of any real threat it represents to our country but because many Muslims visibly and defiantly hold onto their traditions and clothing. Islam and its traditions – be it the hijab, halal food, or praying at the mosque – is regarded as an explicit rejection of Australian (and more broadly Western) ideals, and for that reason, Muslims are seen as a threat that must be extinguished.

Never mind that “tolerance” is one of those values we supposedly do better than anyone else.

Racist statements and ideologies do not magically become non-racist when a non-white person espouses them. Nor does racism have to take the form of neo-Nazism (although there appears to be plenty of that lately), but simply the persistent insistence that non-white people fall into line, that we know our place and that we acknowledge that white culture is the best one.

How racists are co-opting multiculturalism.

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Australia: Citizenship laws ‘not a bravado issue’ says Malcolm Turnbull

2015/06/04 1 Comment

Observing the polarized debate within the Australian Cabinet over citizenship revocation, I can only wonder whether there was a similar debate behind closed doors in the Canadian Cabinet.

I suspect not. Despite the Harper government’s discipline, some glimmer of internal disagreement would likely have become known had it been major:

[Communications Minister and former Liberal party leader] Turnbull has warned that the fight against terrorism is “not a bravado issue” and emphasised the importance of safeguarding the rule of law in Australia.

The communications minister and former Liberal party leader said terrorists “want to destroy us because they hate the rule of law” and he argued a controversial proposal to strip sole nationals of their Australian citizenship raised “very big legal and practical issues”.

Turnbull’s comments provide an insight into the Coalition’s internal dispute over how to deal with the citizenship of Australians suspected of involvement in terrorism. The government has agreed to introduce a bill to give the immigration minister, Peter Dutton, the power to revoke the citizenship of dual nationals linked to terrorism, but deferred a decision on powers to deal with sole nationals after a cabinet backlash last week. Turnbull was among those cabinet critics.

“What is the essence of a democracy? Some people would say a democracy is one where the majority get to do what they want. That’s not a democracy. That’s a tyranny,” Turnbull said at a media conference in Queanbeyan on Wednesday.

“The genius of a democracy governed by the rule of law, our democracy, is that it both empowers the majority through the ballot box, and constrains the majority, its government, so that it is bound by law.”

Turnbull added: “Why does Daesh [another term for Islamic State] hate us? Why do they want to kill us? Why do they want to kill, destroy our society? They want to destroy us because they hate the rule of law.

“They hate the fact that the government has to stand up – can be stood up by citizens and held to account. They hate the fact that we have freedom of speech. They hate the fact that we are a free society governed by law not just by whatever the direction of one religious leader is from time to time.

“Our freedoms are absolutely critical and it is important that we have a debate about this but I just want to be very clear … some people like to suggest that some people are tougher on terrorism or tougher on national security than others.

“Let me say this to you – honest people, knowledgeable people, really well-informed people can have very different views about what the right measures are on national security and have very different views about the right balance between, say, citizenship and national security.”

Citizenship laws ‘not a bravado issue’ says Malcolm Turnbull | Australia news | The Guardian.

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English test should be mandatory for people wanting citizenship in Australia, says Liberal MP Sharman Stone

2015/06/03 Leave a comment

Always interesting to see how Canada and Australia look to each other and adopt similar practices. Minister Kenney, early in his mandate as Secretary of State for Multiculturalism, visited Australia to learn from the then Howard government’s approach to multiculturalism, identity and related issues.

Discover Canada‘s approach was influenced by some of the experience of the Australian “history wars,” the debates over their historical narrative. Express Entry was largely modelled on Australia’s equivalent.

Now the Abbott government is taking a Canadian approach to citizenship revocation for treason or terror and this proposal for greater rigour in language testing may be a variant of the Canadian approach of pre-screening for language competency using an equivalency-based approach (rather than a separate test to administer):

People wanting to become citizens in Australia should have to undertake an English language test, Liberal MP Sharman Stone says, in a push to overhaul the current citizenship requirements.

Would-be citizens are currently asked 20 questions in the Australian “citizenship test” about Australia’s beliefs, values, its law system and Australian people. Questions are multiple choice and require a basic knowledge of English and Australian laws to pass it.

But Dr Stone says the requirements are “slack” and not rigorous enough, supporting a suggestion in a government discussion paper released last week that would require new citizens to sit an English exam before they are announced as Australians.

The paper also suggests “standardising English-language requirements, to ensure citizens have adequate language ability, taking into account particular circumstances such as age”.

Dr Stone said it was not a benefit to the individual, nor for Australia, if people cannot speak English in Australia, drawing from experience at citizenship ceremonies in her Victorian electorate of Murray where she estimates a number of new citizens cannot read, write or speak basic English.

“The citizenship service is a mockery,” she told Fairfax Media.

Knowing the basics of the English language is imperative for people to be able to participate in the Australian society, including voting, jury duty or understanding “Australian responsibilities”, she said.

“It makes me very sorry when people who come into my office and say they need an interpreter and are feeling alienated,” she said.

English test should be mandatory for people wanting citizenship in Australia, says Liberal MP Sharman Stone.

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Australia: Debacle over terrorism and citizenship is leak-based policy in its purest form | Lenore Taylor | Australia news | The Guardian

2015/05/30 Leave a comment

Lenore Taylor of The Guardian on the leak strategy being used to sell the proposed Australian revocation policy change for convicted terrorists:

One might ask what is to be gained from so many headlines galloping so far ahead of actual decisions, or indeed, actual facts.

Does it help the police and intelligence agencies with their very important task of “keeping Australians safe” either by preventing acts of violence in this country, or preventing dangerous foreign fighters from returning, or the strategy for countering violent extremism aimed at stopping people here from becoming radicalised and dangerous?

Or is it playing to a very different audience – with the much more political aim of keeping security threats at the forefront of the national conversation and, perhaps, goading Labor into disagreement so that they can be portrayed as “weak on terror”?

The prime minister’s most powerful advisor is taking a keen interest in the policy and politics of the issue – his chief of staff, Peta Credlin, told a recent meeting of Coalition staff she was spending at least 40% of her time on the issue.

Another clue might lie in yet more information from the prime minister’s office to the Daily Telegraph, this time in an article entitled “The first cracks in Australia’s bipartisan approach to terrorism could doom Bill Shorten” which revealed that the prime minister received 900 emails in the week after the budget expressing anger at the possibility that “repentant Australian jihadis” might be allowed back into the country.

The article praised the prime minister’s “instinctive” response that “If you go abroad to join a terrorist group and you seek to come back to Australia, you will be arrested, you will be prosecuted and jailed” in comparison with Shorten’s reaction that “There are laws in place, I’m not going to play judge and jury.”

But of course, there are laws in place, and they do have evidentiary requirements. Which means the courts may not in every case implement the prime minister’s “instinct”. Which is presumably where the new policy-thought about citizenship-stripping comes in. And Shorten has been pretty careful to make sure there are no “cracks” in the bipartisanship on these issues, no matter what the government proposes.

There is, of course, an alternative to slap-dash policy in response constituent-email reaction, or policy by cabinet-pre-empting, headline-seeking press leak, and that is that old-fashioned idea of policy developed to address a real problem, thought through and discussed by cabinet, before public announcement.

Debacle over terrorism and citizenship is leak-based policy in its purest form | Lenore Taylor | Australia news | The Guardian.

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Goodbye, citizenship! Australia takes a cynical turn on Muslim radicalisation | Jason Wilson | Comment is free | The Guardian

2015/05/28 Leave a comment

Some of the initial critical commentary on Australian plans for citizenship revocation and approach to radicalization, along with the perennial values debate. Echoes of C-51 Government messaging and issues:

You may notice if you read the transcript of Abbott’s press conference that this is political communication that doesn’t impart any information. Is “radicalisation” the same as “violent extremism”? Does one cause the other?

Are they linked in a causal chain? What should we be looking for? What is acceptable for citizens in a democracy to say, think, or read and what isn’t? What is the distinction between “extremism” and ordinary Muslim belief that the government keeps insisting that they respect? From whence comes the assumption that this is related to an insufficient inculcation of the virtues and responsibilities of citizenship?

Anyone who looks to the attorney general’s department’s materials will find a lack of clarity on all of this that is either chilling or embarrassing, depending on your point of view.

We’re told that “People can become radicalised to violent extremism due to a range of factors.” We’re also informed that people can get grants for combatting it to provide support for a range of activities, including mentoring, counselling, “case management” and sport, “But we are open to a wide range of ideas!” And we’re also told that the list of organisations offering services in this area will be collated without being made public. All in all, it’s bewildering.

To the observer, it may seem that debate without any specific terms is being had about existing schemes without clear public criteria of success, with the promise of further discussion whose terms are murky. There’s no reference to the extant scholarly and professional discussion about why and how people drift to Islamism, which emphasises the role of perceived injustice.

More cynically, you might say that this all works pretty well to keep terms like “radicalisation” and “extremism” as content-free, flexible terms that do little more than gesture towards the Muslims in our midst as a source of potential danger, and authorise governments to protect us from that danger, whatever it is, and empower them to police deviations from an equally imaginary moderate middle. A lot of reporting is not helping to clarify the situation: it’s simply taking all of this as read.

This effort by government to produce a vague sense of insecurity, then offer to protect us from it, can lead us in strange and alarming directions. Last week Christopher Pyne mooted a “jihadi-watch” scheme for schools, where education authorities would move to train students and teachers “to watch for shifts in behaviour such as students drifting away from their friends, running into minor trouble with the law and arguing with those who have different ideological views to their own”.

Goodbye, citizenship! Australia takes a cynical turn on Muslim radicalisation | Jason Wilson | Comment is free | The Guardian.

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Dual-national jihadists face loss of Australian citizenship, but not sole nationals yet

2015/05/27 Leave a comment

Out of the Canadian Conservative government (and UK) playbook, with interesting internal disagreement over whether or not this should include revocation in case of statelessness:

Tony Abbott will push ahead with proposed changes to strip dual citizens of their Australian nationality if they are suspected of terrorism, but has deferred a decision on strong new powers against sole nationals after a cabinet backlash.

The prime minister confirmed a bill to be introduced to parliament in coming weeks would grant the immigration minister the discretion to strip dual nationals of their citizenship if they were deemed to be involved in terrorism, even if the person had not been convicted of an offence.

But the government is yet to settle on a position on punishing Australians who hold no other citizenship after several ministers raised significant concerns in cabinet on Monday evening.

It is understood Abbott backed the push by the immigration minister, Peter Dutton, for the power to strip sole nationals of their Australian citizenship in cases where they were entitled to apply for citizenship in another country.

But the attorney general, George Brandis, the defence minister, Kevin Andrews, and the communications minister, Malcolm Turnbull, are believed to be among numerous ministers who raised concerns during the cabinet discussion.

Fairfax Media reported that the foreign affairs minister, Julie Bishop, had also questioned whether another country would be likely to approve a citizenship application for a person from whom Australia had deprived citizenship.

In an interview with Sky News on Tuesday, Brandis emphasised that the government had not made any decisions about second-generation Australians and had instead opted to “lead a national conversation about the rights and obligations associated with citizenship”. This will begin with the release of a discussion paper for community feedback on Tuesday.

Dual-national jihadists face loss of Australian citizenship, but not sole nationals yet | Australia news | The Guardian.

New Zealand Prime Minister Kay takes a different tack with respect to an Australian/New Zealander dual national:

NZ ‘unlikely’ to strip woman’s citizenship – PM

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Australia to Revoke Citizenship of Australian-Born Jihadis – NYTimes.com

2015/05/23 Leave a comment

More the Canadian model than the UK model (given the provision would not be applied to Australians without claim to another nationality to avoid statelessness).

With, of course, the same problems with respect to security (does sending people to countries where they may be free increase or decrease security) and fairness (treating people who have committed similar crimes differently on the basis of nationality):

Australia plans to strip citizenship from Australian-born children of immigrants who become Islamic State fighters in its crackdown on homegrown jihadis, a minister said on Thursday.

The government wants to change the Citizenship Act to make fighting for Islamic State in Syria and Iraq a reason for losing citizenship, Immigration Minister Peter Dutton said.

The government also wants to adopt the British legal model by revoking the citizenship of extremists who are Australian-born children of immigrants or an immigrant, forcing them to take up citizenship in the birth country of their parents, or parent, Dutton said.

Dual nationals could also lose their Australian citizenship, while Australians without claim to another nationality could not.

“The principle for us, which is very important, is that we don’t render people stateless,” Dutton told Sydney Radio 2GB.

Australia to Revoke Citizenship of Australian-Born Jihadis – NYTimes.com.

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PM Tony Abbott Denies Australia Will Sell Citizenship, Reiterates Refusal Of Asylum

2015/05/06 Leave a comment

Not surprising as this goes so much against the grain of Australian immigration and citizenship policy, not to mention identity. Australia is not Malta which does sell citizenship (Malta Offers Citizenship and All Its Perks for a Price).

Hard to know what members of the Productivity Commission were thinking when they proposed this bone-headed scheme:

Prime Minister Tony Abbott denied allegation on Monday, May 4 that the government’s inquiry on immigration system would mean his administration is selling citizenship in a bid to cut down on budget deficit and close down its door to asylum seekers.

Mr Abbott said in a press conference that his government’s request was for Productivity Commission to review proposals in amending the immigration system. But in doing so, Mr Abbott insisted the commission should take into consideration different perspectives and the commission’s statement to make immigration a finance-focused system is unlikely because the coalition government would not allow migrants to earn their permanent residency visas simply by paying entry fees.

The prime minister argued that Australia’s immigration policy is unequivocally and justly based on the country’s best values and interests and as such, Mr Abbott assured the public the policy will remain as it is.

Productivity Commission announced on Friday, May 1 the Australian government is contemplating on adopting a radical system of immigration that centres on the applicant’s financial capacity. At the present, Australia looks at the applicants’ family connection and the nature and level of their skills in allowing access.

The commission contended that should Australia adopt a price-based immigration policy, it will earn several billions which can help curb the country’s budget deficit. In addition, the scheme will also slash down the number of employees involved in the immigration system.

PM Tony Abbott Denies Australia Will Sell Citizenship, Reiterates Refusal Of Asylum.

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German experience in Australia during WW1 damaged road to multiculturalism

2015/04/23 Leave a comment

Australia’s wartime internment and related measures in relation to the German Australian community.

In comparison, Canada had just over 8,500 internees, 5,000 of which were Ukrainian origin, 2,000 German origin. But Canada did not expel them after the war unlike Australia (or unlike many Japanese Canadians ‘encouraged’ to return to Japan following their internment during WW II):

In total, 6890 persons were interned in Australia during the war, including 67 women and 84 children. Despite the official designation “prisoners of war” given to them by the Commonwealth authorities, the internees were mostly civilian Australian residents. They included approximately 700 “naturalised British subjects” and some 70 “native-born British subjects” who were Australian by birth, sometimes second- or even third-generation Australians of German ancestry.

At the end of the war, a total of 6150 persons were “repatriated” – that is, summarily shipped to Germany: a mass deportation unparalleled in Australian history. Of these, 5414 had been interned, the others were family members or non-interned “ex-enemy aliens” who either accepted the government’s offer to be repatriated or were ordered to leave the country.

Six hundred and ninety-nine people were compulsorily deported. The internees who had been brought to Australia from British dominions overseas were not allowed to return to their previous places of residence. They were all summarily deported.

Most of the internees consented to leave Australia voluntarily. They were convinced that there was no future for them in a country that had robbed them of their rights and freedom. A few protested and appealed to stay, only to be rejected by the Aliens Tribunal that had been set up by the Department of Defence.

The tribunal, consisting of a single magistrate, rubber-stamped the applications according to the guidelines issued by the government. As a rule, businessmen and importers were to be deported, while farmers – who were said to “have shown themselves of less potential danger than the German businessman” – were allowed to stay, unless there were unspecified “special reasons”.

Workingmen were to be deported “if there seems to be any doubt of their obtaining regular employment” after the war. Here, as elsewhere, the official language with its curious linguistic construction – that is, some individuals had shown themselves to be less potentially dangerous – reveals the real political motivation hiding behind the bureaucratic rhetoric.

German experience in Australia during WW1 damaged road to multiculturalism.

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