The shadow treasurer, Chris Bowen, has played down the need for a citizenship audit of Australian politicians.
The Greens this week wrote to the Senate president and lower house speaker urging for an independent audit to establish whether others members of parliament fell foul of the constitution’s citizenship requirements.
But Bowen dismissed the proposal for an independent audit of citizenship on Sunday, saying it was a complex matter of law that ought to be left in the hands of the high court.
“Let’s let the high court get on with the job,” Bowen told the ABC on Sunday.
“I understand the interest but we have a robust constitutional institution in Australia. Matt Canavan’s case, for example, is very complicated,” he said.
“I think that the best place for it to be sorted through is before our eminent high court judges.”
Earlier this week, Labor’s shadow finance minister, Jim Chalmers, called for the Coalition to reveal which of its members may hold dual citizenship.
The government holds only a one-seat majority in the lower house.
The holding of dual citizenship has now forced the resignation of two Greens senators, Scott Ludlam and Larissa Waters. The resources minister, Matt Canavan, was forced to resign from cabinet, and questions remain about the eligibility of One Nation senator, Malcolm Roberts.
On Sunday, the finance minister, Mathias Cormann, said he had confirmed he was not a dual citizen, despite being born in Belgium. Cormann said Belgian law caused his citizenship to be extinguished when he voluntarily accepted citizenship in Australia.
“That is something that I confirmed again formally, in the lead-up to my original preselection. I approached the Belgian embassy in Australia at the time to provide me with that confirmation [which] they did,” Cormann told Sky News.
“Belgian law is quite black and white in relation to this; it was at the time anyway,” he said.
Cormann was also asked about recent polling in Western Australia, which predicted four Liberal-held seats in the state could go to Labor at the next election. The poll shows primary support for the Coalition has collapsed almost 10 percentage points since last year’s federal election.
But Cormann was upbeat about the Liberals’ prospects in WA.
“If you look at the fine print it actually says our primary vote according to this poll would be about 39% – which, if that is true, would be an 8% swing back to the WA Liberal party since the state election a few months ago,” he said.
