Being Green Should Be Easier (and Red or Blue too)

Larissa Waters was born in Canada where her Australian Parents who were then studying and working.

She left as an 11-month-old baby and has never again set foot on Canadian soil.

At age 21, she had the choice to take up Canadian citizenship and did not exercise this choice, effectively confirming her “Australianism”.

Her parents were of the opinion this was all she needed to do in order to be considered Australian, and at the time of her birth, it was. Canadian Citizenship law changed a week after she was born.

In good faith, on behalf of the Australian Green Party Larissa Waters stood for election to the Senate in 2011 and was successful. She was again successful at the 2016 election.

She resigned today having discovered that at age 21, instead of simply not taking up Canadian Citizenship, she should have formally denounced it.

The eligibility rules for Federal Parliamentary Candidates are clearly defined as part of our Constitution. They even make sense, although arguably less so now than when they were drafted over 116 years ago.

Larissa Waters should not have stood for election without first denouncing her Canadian dual citizenship.

However, I don’t think anyone is suggesting her nomination for election was in anything other than Good Faith.

Despite being ineligible, her Senate vote has been cast in literally hundreds of cases (in good faith) and will stand.

The Greens will wear criticism over her situation, particularly as it is their second such case in a matter of days. Their Federal Parliamentary Leader Richard Di Natale, has already said the Party will revise its Governance processes to ensure it doesn’t happen again.

In my opinion, the Australian Electoral Commission should be charged with confirming the eligibility of all candidates before they appear on a ballot paper. No candidate should be able to present to the electorate seeking our vote without first being independently confirmed as eligible.

At the last election, former Australian Democrats Leader, Andrew Bartlett was in second position on the Greens Senate ticket in Queensland. It would be reasonable to assume he would have been in first place had Waters been discovered as ineligible. Given the low appeal former Australian Democrats have when running for office under the banner of another Party (think Cheryl Kernot), I doubt he would have attracted the vote Larissa Waters did.

We have had two Green Senators resign within a week, both because they were ineligible to stand in the first place. Both have served terms in excess of 6 years and had significant influence on the floor of the Senate.

Laws have been passed, Bills amended and reforms rejected on their vote.

This is too important to leave to individuals to understand the nuisances of the citizenship details of their country of birth.

The Australian Electoral Commission needs to assume responsible for confirming the eligibility of all candidates and resourced accordingly so they can do so.

We, the Electorate, deserve nothing less.