Foreign Interference Proves We Need Citizenship & Immigration Plebiscite
MEDIA RELEASE
Senator Hanson has called for the results of an official Government poll on her Private Senator’s Bill to toughen citizenship requirements to be disregarded and a plebiscite on citizenship and immigration be held instead, after evidence emerged the poll had been hijacked by foreign nationals, heavily promoting a vote against the Bill.
“This is a disgusting example of foreign interference into Australia’s democratic process.” Senator Hanson said.
“The Government should have already acted on cutting immigration and strengthening citizenship, but have been too cowardly to take a stand. It’s time they put these questions to the public at the next election in the form of a plebiscite.”
“Go online right now and you can find social media pages for so called “refugees” in Indonesia urging foreigners to vote against my Bill. You can find migration agencies in Australia urging their non-citizen clients to vote no. Multiple international student groups are also pushing the no vote, along with official German and Brazilian Honorary Consulate Facebook pages. The whole process has been turned into a joke.”
The One Nation leaders Citizenship Bill calls on: • A new strengthened English test; • An increase in the permanent resident timeframe to 8 years; • Evidence of integration into the community; • and whether the applicant was a risk to security, a proven criminal, had cheated on the English test or made any other relevant misrepresentation.
“The foreign nationals voting NO on this poll aren’t interested in working hard and becoming an Australian the right way. They want it as easy as possible and they don’t care what Australian citizens think. It is incredibly disrespectful.”
One Chinese website promotes the Governments surveys vulnerabilities, telling readers to “vote multiple times with different browsers” and later saying, “For our Chinese interests and future, everyone must actively participate and resolutely vote NO.”
“If Labor and Greens had their way, they’d hand Australian citizenship out in Weet-Bix packets.”
Senator Hanson will be contacting the Prime Minister upon his return from overseas urging him to conduct a plebiscite, in conjunction with the next federal election on immigration and citizenship. “It is the only way to give real Australians a chance to have a voice without the threat of foreign interference.”
“If I hadn’t caught this vote tampering, then there is a very real possibility this tainted poll would have been used as evidence against my proposed citizenship changes or any future amendments.”
“If the point of this poll was to gauge the public’s opinion on citizenship reform, then it failed badly. Now we have to make sure it is done properly.”
Senator Hanson has written to the committee and urged them to disregard the outcome of the poll, whatever the result, and urged them to investigate the matter further.
The Citizenship poll will close at 5pm sharp today (27th April 2018) with results on the poll reported by the Legal and Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee by 4 December 2018.
