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February 22, 2025
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke has been accused of concocting a citizenship backlog by western Sydney mayors and the Coalition, who claim Labor has engineered an industrial-scale "vote-buying citizenship tactic" that could backfire weeks out from a knife-edge election.
Despite government claims it had ordered 25 election-eve citizenship ceremonies to slash an almost 50,000-person backlog by 12,852, Fairfield mayor Frank Carbone revealed that his council had "no waiting list".
Ahead of a likely April 5 or 12 election, the Department of Home Affairs shocked mayors in seven cities after ordering mass citizenship ceremonies, which have been orchestrated to allow thousands of people to enrol to vote in key seats.
The fast-tracked cohort is dominated by citizens originating from India (2365), New Zealand (1929), Britain (853), Philippines (581), China (556), Pakistan (396), Vietnam (381) and Afghanistan (289).
Sydney mayors said on Friday that the citizenship "backlog" either did not exist, was "manufactured" or was linked to an unprecedented surge in processing in the past few months.
Southwest Sydney councils confirmed that no concerns had been raised previously by the Albanese government and they had cleared most of their Covid-induced backlogs.
Mr Burke, who is also Immigration Minister, wrote to councils this month to inform them he had instructed his department to hold additional citizenship ceremonies between February 17 and March 4. The ceremonies were organised to enable thousands of new citizens to enrol with the Australian Electoral Commission before polling day.
Mr Carbone, whose council will host a scheduled citizenship ceremony next week, said: "I can only conclude that this is a photo opportunity for the minister and to promote Labor".
"I'm scratching my head as to why the minister feels it important to do these (mass ceremonies), and I'm concerned that, given we have none on our waiting list, where are they being processed from," Mr Carbone said.
"The time we needed mass ceremonies was just after Covid when (our) waiting list was 6000; it is now more like 50.
Given the minister only turned up weeks before (an election) ... I can only conclude that this is a photo opportunity for the minister and to promote Labor."
Liverpool mayor Ned Mannoun, a Liberal Party figure in western Sydney, said it was a "blatant stack" and questioned where the backlog claims had come from, given his council was able to provide 97 per cent of new citizens with certificates within the department's sixmonth recommended timeline.
"The minister's claim (of a backlog) is completely inaccurate," Mr Mannoun said of his own council.
He suggested Labor's "tactic" could backfire. "I wonder if these new Australians are in fact more socially conservative, likely to be Liberal voters, and it's up to our party to appeal to them," he said.
While an Australian Electoral Commission enrol-tovote information sheet and QR code are typically provided to new citizens, up to eight AEC officials urged attendees to enrol at a mass Sydney Olympic Park citizenship ceremony on Friday.
The Australian understands the AEC provides the Department of Home Affairs with soft copies of materials and information packs but were not involved in "running the venue", with the department organising a giant screen behind Mr Burke displaying a QR code and urging new citizens to "enrol to vote".
"Now that you are an Australian citizen, you have a right and a responsibility to enrol and vote in federal, state, territory and local elections," said an AEC message on the screen.
While Labor sources claimed it was impossible to know how many of the almost 13,000 new voters would vote for Labor, Coalition insiders said historic trends showed new Australians typically displayed initial goodwill towards incumbent governments that had authorised their citizenship.
Labor figures, who are preparing for an election to be called within weeks, have become increasingly concerned about backlashes in ALP heartland seats across western Sydney and expect significant swings against the government and gabinet ministers.
Mr Burke, who on Friday night attended a Labor fundraiser for Fowler candidate Tu Le who is seeking to unseat independent MP Dai Le in the southwestern Sydney seat, said the mayors were "having a little bit of a whinge" and demanded they "show a bit of patriotism".
"I just say to the people who've tried to whinge about this today, show a bit of patriotism, be proud when someone wants to make a lifelong pledge of commitment to Australia," Mr Burke said.
"That's incorrect ... that somehow these were targeted seats. I don't care what seat people are from, I don't care which way people are going to vote."
Opposition home affairs spokesman James Paterson accused Mr Burke of "showing indecent haste in rushing through these industrial scale citizenship ceremonies on the eve of an election".
"If this was sincerely about clearing a backlog, Labor would have started a year ago," Senator Paterson said. "But writing to local councils weeks out from a federal election speaks volumes."
The Liberal Party and independents have launched campaigns across Labor-held working-class, multicultural and aspirational electorates on the back of disenchantment with the ALP for not representing their interests, failing to pick candidates that represent their communities, concerns about the cost-of-living crisis and the government's response to the Israel-Hamas conflict.
Labor MPs and ministers who strongly supported same-sex marriage and the Indigenous voice referendum hold western Sydney seats where significant majorities of voters rejected both proposals.
The Liberals believe they will win or run close in Labor seats including Bennelong, Parramatta, Gough Whitlam's former electorate of Werriwa, Reid, Macarthur, Greenway and Macquarie.
Mr Burke himself is fending off a pro-Palestine independent in Watson, co-ordinated and backed by The Muslim Vote movement, which is also supporting a candidate in Jason Clare's Blaxland. The seats have the largest percentage of Muslim voters in the country.
Mr Burke said he had thought "Australia Day ceremonies might do a lot to clear the backlog ... turns out they didn't".
