Dual Australian Citizenship Essay

In this essay I will examine the development of Australian society and subsequent rights given to Australian citizens, thus addressing the guiding question as quoted at the top of the paper.

On October 26th Barnaby Joyce, Australia’s prime minister, lost his seat for “allegedly” being a New Zealander. Later it was confirmed that he was. Joyce states that he “had no reason to believe he was a citizen of any other country”. This took place in Sydney, Australia. The problem with this situation is that “in section 44 of the country’s constitution” it says that you cannot be a citizen of any other country but Australia in order to be part of the country’s government. This affects many people including the citizens of Australia and their constitution. The constitution could be changed in order for this controversy to be ended. Also because this is 2017 and in Australia “a quarter of Australia's population was born overseas”. If the constitution

Citizenship laws are laws that state how Australian are considered a citizen, their rights, and responsibilities and how they are meant to be treated. In 1901 when the Constitution was first written at first, Indigenous citizens of Australia, women, and immigrants didn't have the rights as they have today. Other laws were passed and changes to the Constitution was made, they were given these rights through these things.

The referendum campaign effectively focused public attention on the fact that Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Australians were second class citizens with all sorts of limitations - legislative and social - on their lives. This decade-long campaign to change the Constitution came to symbolise the broader struggle for justice being fought during these years. Activists presented the case for a Commonwealth government

In 2010, the Australian Federal Government released its Counter-Terrorism White Paper. It stipulates that Australia’s counter-terrorism strategy has four fundamental key points: (The Counter-Terrorism White Paper, 2010, p iii) Analysis - focussed on prevention through intelligence, protection - focussed on border management and increased airport security, Response - cooperative relationships between Intelligence, security and Law enforcement agencies nationally and Resilience - Unified rejection

The inherent malleability of section 51(xxvi) of the Constitution, also known as the ‘race power’, suggests the continuing historical and institutional racism against Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. To overcome discriminatory laws to be passed against Indigenous Australians and to allow the advancement of their situation, it is necessary to amend the race power. This article will propose the amendment of s 51(xxvi) to only allow beneficial laws to be passed with regards to Indigenous Australians, the replacement of s 51(xxvi) with an anti-discrimination power and the replacement of s 51(xxvi) with a new head of power with respect to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. These proposals will be analysed considering the judgements in Kartinyeri v Commonwealth and the recommendations made by the Referendum Council.

Constitutional Recognition is about the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people wanting to be recognised in the Australian Constitution. As the first people in our nation, they should be recognised and treated as equals. The Constitution is the founding legal document of our nation. It sets out the rules of Parliament and how lawmakers, government and courts operate. The Constitution was approved at Referendum by the people in the Australian Colonies between 1898 and 1900 and came into effect on the 1st of January 1901.

In essence, this means that the government still has power to prohibit entire races from voting in elections. In an interview of Marcia Langdon, widely accredited Aboriginal Historian, conducted by the Sydney Morning Herald, Marcia stated that in order for our nation to move forward, section 25, a 19th century document, should be deleted as " because it looks racist and could well be racist - and put in a provision that guarantees no racial discrimination by the Parliament or by governments." (*interview). Even though rights for Indigenous People have changed, a similar treatment is happening to asylum seekers coming to Australia in search of security. Their movements, actions, freedom, etc. Is all being controlled by governments while they are not allowed out of specialised Detention Centres. This treatment of refugees and the treatment of Aboriginal people put Australia as one of the top countries of human rights violators (Healey, 2000). The 1967 referendum did indeed mark to the Aboriginal people that times were changing, but Australia still has a long way to go in terms of fixing

individuals who are not Australian residents and don't have consent to be in the nation) to be

This article speaks of The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders have rejecting the idea of constitutional recognition at the Uluru convention held recently and they push for a constitutionally enshrined Indigenous voice in the Australian Parliament and a commission that will hopefully lead to a treaty. More than 250 community leaders came together for the Uluru conference in discussing the future and what seemed to be the biggest topic, changes made in recognizing the Aboriginal and Toress Strait Islander people in the Australian constitution. Per the article, The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander leaders have rejected the idea of constitutional recognition and will instead push for a constitutionally enshrined Indigenous

The purpose of the text by John Howard is to inform Australian citizens of the current situation of the possible terrorist threat that may face Australia and requests that all people report suspicious behaviour of those around one another to the National security hotline in which, all reported behaviour will be investigated to protect Australia. Uniting the community as one, to help protect Australia. The letter containing information of the counter-terrorism also includes reassuring information about Australia’s ‘strong counter-terrorist capability’ and emergency preparedness, to avoid panic from the public. The purpose of the text is to acknowledge Australia’s vulnerability to international terrorism following

The 1948 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting decided to make major changes in nationality laws throughout the Commonwealth, following Canada's decision to enact its Canadian citizenship law in 1946. Until then all Commonwealth countries, with the exception of the Irish Free State, had a single nationality status of British subject. It was decided at that conference that the United Kingdom and the self-governing dominions would each adopt a separate national citizenship, while retaining the common status of British subject. The Nationality and Citizenship Act 1948, which came into force on 26 January 1949, gave effect to that arrangement and created the concept of Australian nationality while continuing to be British subjects. However,

As above demonstrates, this Act provides controversial, unusual and empowering duties to ASIO. The unusual and contentious background to this Act is highlighted by the long debate prior to its enactment. This act took almost the longest in history to enact- 15 months of parliamentary debate occurred, and after such scrutiny, a sunset clause of 10 years was applied to the act. The Coalition government gave reasoning for this 10 year clause as ‘there was still a threat of terrorist attack and it was undesirable to distract ASIO from its operations any more frequently than necessary’. Others said that terror is a ‘is a long-term, generational threat’ and the Australian citizens deserve to have protection from such threats. However, this threat

Identify and investigate a contemporary law reform issue- In the past few years there have been Australians travelling to countries mainly Syria and Iraq to go and fight alongside the Islamic State ISIS) the number of Australians have increased. These Australians are known as Australian Jihadists’, Many of the Jihadists’ that go forth and fight for ISIS go with fixed ideas as to what is will be like, but when the Australians arrive it is nothing as like they imagine nor anticipated. A number of these Australians realise their mistakes and they attempt to return back into the country. Due to the number of Jihadists’ the Australian government more specifically Peter Dutton the Minister of immigration has introduced a parliament bill to Strip away Australians of their Dual nationals of citizenship, with this law Peter believes this will stop Australians flying to Syria to fight and think they can come back into Australia. This bill is still in progress and has not been confirmed yet but it is set to pass but with significant changes.

Question ‐ What trends are evident in terrorism over the past 5 years? How have these trends impacted on the ways in which counter terrorism has responded in the Australian context?