The Australian
Conservatives, on Wednesday, August 9, released their Immigration
and Citizenship policy. The five-part programme covers everything from Visa
reform to the demand that refugee intakes be determined by Australia itself, as
a sovereign state, and not imposed on us by supranational organisations such as
the United Nations.
The Left and the PC
brigade will be scandalised by the notion that immigration should be in Australia’s
“economic, social and cultural interest”. We have reached a strange juncture, surely,
when looking after the best interests of our country has become contentious.
Cory Bernardi’s plan
to halve our current net immigration makes sense. Why, we need to ask, is the
Turnbull government running the largest per capita immigration agenda in the
world? The ‘Big Australia’ vision of both Labor and Coalition governments
resulted in our population soaring by more than 20 percent between 2003-2015. ‘Big
Australia’, in reality, means unmanageable pressure on “services,
infrastructure and family incomes”.
The Australian
Conservatives are also prepared call out the family reunion stream. The family
reunion provision has been a generous way to make it easier for new migrants to begin the path towards
integration into Australian society. It was not intended to be exploited by
those born in this country. The commitment by the Australian Conservatives to
“legislate that family members may only be brought to Australia if those
members are declared at the time of the initial visa application” is,
therefore, a masterstroke.
The
final component of the Australian Conservatives’ immigration policy addresses
residency and citizenship, with ten years of crime-free and terror-free residence
required before citizenship is granted. In the end, the Immigration and Citizenship policy of the Australian Conservatives asserts
that citizenship should have the same meaning for the newcomer as it does for
those inviting them into our democratic and free country.
