13th May 2020, 4:37 PM – Senate Motions - Citizenship - Backlog for citizenship ceremonies

The majority voted in favour of a motion introduced by Tasmanian Senator Anne Urquhart (Labor), which means it passed. Motions like these don't make any legal changes on their own but can be politically influential because they represent the will of the Senate.

Motion text

That the Senate—

(a) notes that:

(i) the Department of Home Affairs is currently overseeing a backlog of 85,000 people still waiting to make their pledge at an Australian citizenship ceremony,

(ii) after years of living in and contributing to our country, prospective citizens are now waiting upwards of two years for a ceremony,

(iii) these Australians are being forced to wait years for the chance to pledge themselves in front of communities they have helped to build,

(iv) citizenship ceremonies are important events that bring our communities together and should be treated with priority,

(v) trials of one-on-one online ceremonies are now taking place and progress is being made, but the Government has provided very little information about who is being included and how long people will need to wait for their ceremony, and

(vi) the Government has not provided vital information to tens of thousands of people who are waiting for their citizenship interviews and tests; and

(b) urges the Government to:

(i) provide transparency to people working to become Australian citizens; and

(ii) act quickly to avoid extending citizenship processing times even further.