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Affirm Your Australian Citizenship Online
In this section of our website, we provide you with an opportunity to affirm your Australian citizenship even if you are unable to attend a Citizenship Affirmation Ceremony in person. In addition, if you are not an Australian citizen, and you feel you have a strong commitment to Australia, you can also affirm your loyalty to Australia.
Citizenship affirmation is not something which should be entered into lightly or without due consideration. Before you decide whether you would like to affirm your citizenship (or your loyalty to Australia if you are not a citizen) using the Online Affirmation Facility on our website, please carefully review the information we have provided below.
Australian Citizenship Day
The concept of Australian Citizenship Day was first introduced in 2001. It is now held annually on 17 September. On Australian Citizenship Day, many naturalisation ceremonies are held around Australia for permanent residents who are taking Australian citizenship by grant. Some 900,000 permanent residents in Australia are eligible to apply for Australian citizenship - almost the same number of Australians - approximately one million - live overseas.
Ideas as to how people can celebrate Australian citizenship (on Citizenship Day or at other times) are outlined on the Government's Citizenship website.
Australians overseas have much to celebrate each year on 17 September, Australian Citizenship Day. Due to recent legislative change, which the Southern Cross Group worked hard to achieve, with effect from 4 April 2002, those Australian citizens who acquire another citizenship no longer forfeit their Australian citizenship under Australian law, because Section 17 of the Australian Citizenship Act 1948 has been repealed. Further, from 1 July 2007, when the Australian Citizenship Act 2007 comes into force, thousands in the Australian diaspora will have a new right to apply for Australian citizenship. This expat fixes in this legislation are largely the result of some seven years of advocacy and lobbying work by the SCG.
We have learned that the campaign leading up to the repeal of Section 17 as well as the work put in to bring about the reforms in the Australian Citizenship Act 2007 have caused many Australians overseas and those with Australian heritage to think about what citizenship means to them. For that reason we believe that many people may at this time wish to affirm their citizenship, and we explain citizenship affirmation further below. The Government's Citizenship website outlines the responsibilities and privileges of Australian citizenship.
What About People Who Lost Their Australian Citizenship Before 4 April 2002?
While the repeal of Section 17 is an exciting reform for the majority of expatriate Australians and a reform worth celebrating, we must also reflect on the fact that before 4 April 2002 thousands of loyal Australians were stripped of their citizenship while Section 17 was still law when they acquired another citizenship. Up until now, not all of those people have been able resume their citizenship under the law in force until 30 June 2007. Essentially, people who did not feel able to declare an intention to reside in Australia again within three years have been unable to resume their lost citizenship.
But from 1 July 2007, that hurdle will go away with the coming into force of the Australian Citizenship Act 2007. For many years, the SCG has been calling upon the Government to simply resumption rules to be more inclusive. Our media release for Australian Citizenship Day 2002 was specific on this point, as was our media release for Australia Day in January 2003. In addition, see our page Resumption of Lost Australian Citizenship, and our primary and supplementary submissions to the 2003-2004 Senate Inquiry into Australian Expatriates.
Simplified Resumption is now a Reality
On 7 July 2004, the then Minister for Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs, the Hon Gary Hardgrave MP, announced that the Government would change the law to enable simplified resumption of citizenship for various groups of people, and that it would in addition enable access to Australian citizenship for the first time for a number of individuals who have missed out before altogether. Read the Minister's Media Release of 7 July 2004 here for full details. Australian war brides and their children in the USA, among many others, will benefit greatly from these reforms.
Although they were a long time coming, these promised reforms were finally enacted as law in the form of the Australian Citizenship Act 2007, on 1 March 2007. The Act received Royal Assent on 15 March 2007, and the provisions relevant to expat Australians will come into force on 1 July 2007. Those who automatically forfeited their Australian citizenship on the voluntary acquisition of another citizenship prior to 4 April 2002 will now have a right to apply to resume their Australian citizenship and will only have to show good character.
If you are unclear as to how the new legislation might impact you or your family, please e-mail us.
To be kept up to date on this and other developments of interest to Australians abroad, make sure you are signed up to our free e-bulletin list.
Note that some points we believe are still necessary to completely reform Australia's citizenship law to benefit all those in the Australian diaspora are not included in the Australian Citizenship Act 2007. For a catalogue of what we believe the Government has missed, see our Supplementary Submission to the Senate Inquiry into Australian Expatriates dated 23 July 2004, and the letter we wrote to the Shadow Minister for Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs, Senator Annette Hurley, on 1 December 2005. Further, we spelt out all the deficits in the Bill (as it then was) in our submissions to the Senate Inquiry into the Bill in early 2006. All submissions to that Inquiry can be read here.
In particular, the most glaring omission from the 2007 Act is the fact that children born to people after their formal renunciation of citizenship using Section 18 of the Australian Citizenship Act 1948 are not covered. This in particular means that some 3000 Maltese children with Australian-born parents have been excluded from Australian citizenship. See the special section of our website for more details. Unfortunately, all the indications are that the present Coalition Government is not going to give ground on this point, although the Opposition (ALP) moved an unsuccessful amendment when the legislation was going through Parliament. On the other hand, children born to people who automatically lost their citizenship under Section 17, when they voluntarily acquired another citizenship before 4 April 2002, are covered by the new Act.
How You Can Help: An Online Citizenship Affirmation
If you are an individual who supports the reforms in the Australian Citizenship Act 2007, whether or not you personally stand to benefit from them, we ask you to indicate this as you use our affirmation facility below.
Use your online citizenship affirmation not only to affirm your commitment to Australia, but also to remind the Minister that the Government has still not included in the 2007 Act some points of reform which continue to negatively impact expat Australian families.
Please support us in this matter by choosing to add a special paragraph in your online affirmation.
What About People Who Were Forced to Formally Renounce Their Australian Citizenship in the Past?
Separately to those who automatically forfeited Australian citizenship under the now-repealed Section 17 when they acquired another citizenship, many thousands of people have formally renounced their citizenship under Section 18 of the Australian Citizenship Act 1948, but they did so with great sadness, and only because the citizenship law of another country required them to take this step. There are approximately 2,000 former Australians in Malta who fall into this category, and even though Malta now allows dual citizenship, many former Australian, now Maltese citizens have not been able to resume their lost Australian citizenship because of limitations under Australian citizenship law in place until 30 June 2007. Read our media release of 15 September 2002 on this special resumption problem here. The ALP also addressed this issue in its January 2003 Citizenship Policy Statement and accompanying media release.
We are pleased to report that the Australian Citizenship Act 2007, in force from 1 July 2007, will allow the resumption of Australian citizenship for people who had to renounce their Australian citizenship under Section 18 of the 1948 Act in the past. But children born to them overseas after they renounced will not be allowed to enjoy Australian citizenship as part of the reforms. We put in extensive lobbying efforts to try to convince the Coalition Government to include these children, in the period 2004-2006, but we were unsuccessful. See the special section of our site for Australian-born Maltese for more information.
What is Citizenship Affirmation?
Citizenship Affirmation Ceremonies were introduced in 1999 and usually happen in conjunction with a naturalisation ceremony. The Australian Government would like to see them become a permanent part of Australian culture.
An Australian Citizenship Affirmation is a statement that all Australians can make to affirm their loyalty and commitment to Australia and its people. The affirmation is based on the Australian Citizenship Pledge made by citizenship candidates at citizenship ceremonies when they become Australian citizens.
The Australian Citizenship Affirmation reads:
As an Australian citizen,
I affirm my loyalty to Australia and its people,
whose democratic beliefs I share,
whose rights and liberties I respect,
and whose laws I uphold and obey.
Everyone is welcome to affirm his or her citizenship, and participation is entirely voluntary. It is important to give due consideration to the affirmation words above before you use our online affirmation facility below. You may feel that an affirmation is not appropriate for you. If you would like to print out an Affirmation Card containing the words of the affirmation, click here.
If you were born in Australia then you most likely obtained your Australian citizenship by birth. As an Australian citizen by birth, you would never have had the opportunity to pledge your commitment to Australia at a citizenship ceremony, unlike overseas-born Australians who obtained Australian citizenship by grant. So for Australian-born Australians, the affirmation is an opportunity that did not exist before to declare the importance you attach to your Australian citizenship.
Can Those Who Are Not Formally Australian Citizens Affirm Their Loyalty to Australia?
If you are not an Australian citizen you still may wish to express your loyalty to Australia by using the online affirmation. In this case you simply leave out the first line of the affirmation. There are many people who are not formally Australian citizens at present, but who consider Australia to be "home" or very special.
For example, individuals who lost their Australian citizenship under Section 17 of the Australian Citizenship Act 1948 (before it was repealed with effect from 4 April 2002) would fall into this category, if they have not resumed their lost citizenship. In addition, those who have renounced their Australian citizenship under Section 18 of the 1948 Act (e.g. Maltese citizens born in Australia) may also wish to affirm their continuing commitment to Australia.
Does Affirmation Have Legal Status?
Citizenship Affirmations have no status in law and no legal effect. No records on participants are required by the Department of Immigration and Citizenship. Affirmation certificates are not issued. Citizenship ceremonies, on the other hand, at which Australian citizenship is conferred on permanent residents in Australia, serve to fulfil legal requirements prescribed by the Australian Citizenship Act 1948 and must be conducted by Presiding Officers approved by the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship. New Australian citizens receive a citizenship certificate at those ceremonies.
Overseas Affirmation Ceremonies for Australians and Former Australians
As far as the Southern Cross Group is aware, very few Citizenship Affirmation Ceremonies have ever been conducted overseas for the some one million Australians who reside abroad and other members of the Australian diaspora who may not be Australian citizens in the formal legal sense. The Southern Cross Group itself organised Affirmation Ceremonies in London and Ottawa in February 2003 which were very successful, and at which the then Minister for Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs, the Hon Gary Hardgrave MP presided.
Because overseas Australians are scattered all over the world, we thought that many in the expatriate community would welcome an opportunity to affirm their citizenship in an online capacity, and therefore we have provided the facility below. We know from the enormous support which expatriate Australians have given the Southern Cross Group in its dual citizenship campaign that Australian citizenship is highly prized by those abroad and that thousands of Australians overseas are passionate about their citizenship. Indeed, as the Government itself stated in May 2001, all Australians are linked by the "common bond" of citizenship.
Our online citizenship affirmation facility will remain available indefinitely, and can be used at any time. Nevertheless, we do not rule out that citizenship affirmation ceremonies could be held overseas in the future in particular locations where enough interest is shown. Affirmation ceremonies are significant occasions and are intended to convey important symbolism.
If you are interested in helping us to organise a citizenship affirmation ceremony in your area, or if an Australian expatriate group with which you are involved is interested in this initiative, please get in touch. You may also wish to read DIMIA's Affirmation Guidelines and/or order Citizenship Affirmation products from Canberra.
Online Citizenship Affirmation Facility for Australian Citizens >>>
Online Affirmation of Loyalty for Non-Australian Citizens >>>
