Labor facing four dual citizen by-elections

Wednesday 9 May 2018

It comes full circle:

Senator Gallagher argued she took “reasonable steps” to renounce her British citizenship prior to the last election, but due to administrative complications, it had not been processed before nominations closed.
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The court did not accept that and, in a decision handed down Wednesday morning, found Senator Gallagher ineligible.

The four lower house MPs facing byelections are Mr Wilson and Labor’s Susan Lamb and Justine Keay, as well as Rebekha Sharkie of the Centre Alliance, formerly the Nick Xenophon Team.

All those MPs were dual British citizens at the cut-off date, but have relied on the same defence as Senator Gallagher – that they took reasonable steps to renounce before the deadline.

Attorney General Christian Porter called on opposition leader Bill Shorten to force the Labor MPs under a cloud to resign.

One wonders if this won’t mushroom into a full blown early election.

About the author

David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific's leading geo-politics and economics portal. He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.