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February 25, 2025
Citizenship timing 'all about Burke' Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke instructed staff to organise the timing of a citizenship blitz around his calendar, giving him a chance to pose with new voters, a Labor candidate and marginal seat MPs.
Home Affairs Department secretary Stephanie Foster told Senate estimates on Monday about the role Mr Burke had in organising a block of citizenship ceremonies held last week. "He asked us to schedule ... ceremonies, and obviously gave us a window of availability," she said.
In a statement posted on social media on Sunday night, independent Fowler MP Dai Le attacked Mr Burke after he and staff with Home Affairs claimed she had been offered an invite to one of the controversial large-scale citizenship ceremonies conducted by the Albanese government.
Ms Le's political partner, Fairfield mayor Frank Carbone, was offered a seat at the ceremonies, held in Sydney's Olympic Park, as was Labor's candidate for Fowler Tu Le.
"It's deeply frustrating to see how far minister Tony Burke is willing to go to manipulate our community for political gain. Recently, he embarked on a votegrabbing spree, bringing around 12,000 new citizens to Homebush for an induction ceremony. His claim that he invited me but I 'boycotted' the event is a flat-out lie," Dai Le said.
"I was never invited to the event. The invitation was extended to the mayor of Fairfield, and as per standard protocol, it wasn't transferable. So how could I have 'boycotted' something I wasn't even invited to? "For the Labor government to politicise something as important and meaningful as a citizenship ceremony is appalling. This is politics at its absolute lowest using new citizens as political pawns in a desperate attempt to cling to power."
Other Labor MPs vying to hold on to marginal Labor seats in the western Sydney battlegrounds such as Bennelong's Jerome Laxale and Werriwa's Anne Stanley attended the events, posing for photos alongside new citizens.
Staff, under questioning from opposition home affairs spokesperson James Paterson, said people were waiting an average of 105 days to be given citizenship after passing their tests.
Anthony Albanese chided Dai Le over her attack and said the issue was a "complete non-story" when questioned at a press conference on Monday.
"Dai Le, for reasons that I find very unusual, isn't just the federal member for Fowler; she ran for council last year and is the deputy mayor of Fairfield as well. The mayor of Fairfield was certainly invited, as was appropriate," the Prime Minister said. "This was a big citizenship ceremony in Homebush which is in the electorate of Reid nowhere else (it's) not even next to Fowler." The ceremonies were held at Olympic Park and saw more than 4500 new Australians made citizens. The ceremonies had already sparked criticism for injecting migrant votes into key western Sydney seats that Labor is attempting to retain or reclaim.
Home Affairs estimated the backlog in citizenships awaiting confirmation sat at around 50,000. "These ceremonies are happening all around the country at the moment and it looks like they are playing political favourites here, but that will be a very serious issue for the Department of Home Affairs, for the secretary, Stephanie Foster," Senator Paterson said. "I want to understand what, if anything, the department did to satisfy itself that this wasn't being abused for partisan political purposes as it very clearly appears that it was."
Tu Le's candidacy was announced in October after she was overlooked in 2022 at the objection of the local Labor branch.
Former NSW premier Kristina Keneally was parachuted into the once-safe Labor seat in favour of her. Ms Keneally was then defeated by Dai Le.
