E&EO………………………………………………………………………………………….
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
Joining us now from Canberra is Immigration Minister Peter Dutton. Minister, thanks for your time this morning.
PETER DUTTON:
Thanks Sam.
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
Firstly can you confirm the citizenship overhaul and the Australian values questions?
PETER DUTTON:
Well the Prime Minister and I will be making a statement later this morning, but as you say we are tightening up the citizenship arrangements we have …
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
…so that's a yes?
PETER DUTTON:
Yes it is. And I think we should be proud of the fact that as a country we want the best people to become Australian citizens. That's been the history of migration in this country for many, many decades and we want to reflect Australian values in that decision. We want people to come here abide by our laws and to adopt Australian values.
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
This is a massive crackdown to join ‘Team Australia’ isn't it? These are tough changes.
PETER DUTTON:
Well it's a pretty big prize. Once you get Australian citizenship you've got access to a very generous welfare system, to a very generous health and education system and we want people to respect and honour their culture. We want people to make sure that they always remember where they've come from. We want to make sure that when they get here though to our country, in doing all of that they abide by our laws and they adopt our values and I think that's what most Australians would support.
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
Let's talk about a few of the questions that stand out, a few of the new questions. Questions on hitting your wife, your spouse. Questions about genital mutilation and whether that's acceptable or not. Forcing children to marry. These are pretty pointed, aren't they? They're pointed at one particular religion.
PETER DUTTON:
They're not pointed at anybody in particular. They're pointed at people who might think that domestic violence is okay. Well it's not. And clearly as a country we have an issue in relation to domestic violence and there's a lot that the federal and state governments are doing to reduce the incidents of domestic violence. But we should say to people who want to become Australian citizens that it is against the law and if you have a different view, frankly we don't want you to become an Australian citizen. I think we should be very open about that, very frank about it and I don't think we'll apologise for it.
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
This is one culture in particular though and one religious extreme area that obviously the Government has decided to crack down on.
PETER DUTTON:
No let's deal with that Sam. So if you're talking about the Muslim community, the Islamic community, 99 per cent of people are law abiding, do the right thing, there's no question about that and they would find domestic violence as abhorrent as you and I.
So we want to crack down on people – I don't care of their religious background, their ethnicity – what I want is frankly for people to abide by our laws, adopt our values. I want them to send their kids to school. If they're of working age and they have an ability to work I want them working, not on welfare.
I want people to be able to become great Australians which is the migrant story of our country and we can only do that if in respecting people's heritage and their culture and their background, they in accepting Australian citizenship abide by our laws, adopt our values and integrate into our community and I think that is a very reasonable ask for a new country as generous as ours.
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
Critics of this today are saying that your government is playing into the hands of Pauline Hanson, Cory Bernardi. Do you agree with that or do you think these changes needed to happen?
PETER DUTTON:
Well I can't understand the argument against, for example, saying to somebody who is a perpetrator of domestic violence or who would advocate domestic violence or abuse of a female that they should become an Australian citizen. If people want to put that case then let them put it.
But I think we've been very clear. We want people to have a better proficiency around English language because if you do that it means that you have a greater chance of getting a job and maybe a better paying job which is a good example for your kids and that again is the migrant story. We want people coming here, not to go onto welfare, but to be working.
And I think the vast majority of Australians who are paying taxes, working hard, providing for their own kids, making sure that their kids turn up to school, making sure that their kids aren't involved in gang violence - whatever it is - they are Australian values that we want to adhere to and we would ask that of new Australians and that's what we're doing today.
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
Minister, how quickly can you get these changes through? When will we see them happen?
PETER DUTTON:
Well we have an effective start date of today. We'll inform the Labor Party and the Independent senators of the detail and we'll need their support in the Senate.
But we are very clear about our position here Sam and that is that we do want to put Australia first. We do want put our values up front. People should know that if you want to become an Australian citizen, it's a great country, but to keep it great into the future we want people to abide by the law and abide by our values and I think that will receive wide support from across the Australian community.
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
Just really quickly Minister, this is said to be a three pronged attack. First it was the 457 visas, today we've got the citizenship test. Is there more to come on this Australia first policy?
PETER DUTTON:
There's a lot of work that we're doing in the migration space. Obviously the priority was to protect our borders, to stop the boats, stop drownings at sea, we've got all the kids out of detention. We're up by about 1200 per cent on the number of visa cancellations of Outlaw Motor Cycle Gang members, paedophiles and the rest. We have abolished the 457 programme where there was big rorting and a doubling of those numbers when Bill Shorten was the Employment Minister. We're making these announcements today and we will make further announcements, but at the moment today we're talking about the citizenship changes.
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
Sure. Ok. Peter Dutton, we thank you for your time today.
PETER DUTTON:
Thanks Sam.
SAMANTHA ARMYTAGE:
All the best.
