If the dual citizen scandal wasn’t bad enough that it claimed the Deputy Prime Minister and the deputy leader of the National Party, among others, last week, the situation became even more diabolical this week when the Senate president, Liberal Stephen Parry, confirmed he is also a British citizen and resigned.
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And on Friday Federal Environment and Energy Minister Josh Frydenberg says a report suggesting he may hold Hungarian citizenship by descent is "absurd". He says his Budapest-born mother was stateless when she arrived in Australia in 1950 as a migrant, aged seven.
The question on everyone’s mind is how many more sitting on the benches are ineligible?
Despite the assurance of proper vetting processes by the Liberals and the Labor party, who to this point have escaped the technical axe, and the spectacular misstep of the Prime Minister erroneously prejudging the validity of his minister’s cases, the real consequence of this seeming debacle is evaporating confidence.
Senator Parry’s decision to sit back and watch the High Court drama unfold then come forward has only made the matter worse. Under the circumstances, he can’t expect much sympathy among voters.
The delay looks like concealment and further erodes the confidence of Australians. The erosion has grown out of the perceived incompetence of leaders unable to even fill in paper work.
This ultimately is a sin of omission.
Debate about the inviolability of the constitution is one thing, but this is not a question of the politicians’ dedication to Australia, but rather another nation’s almost purely technical hold on them through historical anomaly and parentage.
Putting aside the law, which of course we can’t without a change to the constitution, what is the consequence of this apart from a parliamentary meltdown?
It is worth recalling as well that as far back as 1998 the Parliament's Legal and Constitutional Affairs Committee examined the issue and, recognising its complexity in the modern world, recommended the subsection be replaced with a basic requirement that MPs be Australian citizens, and parliament decide what grounds of foreign allegiance would disqualify MPs.
What will restore the confidence? A full audit of both houses, or even a full double dissolution, or a change of the constitution so the issue is no longer an issue?