Nat Barr has questioned the priorities of Peter Dutton following his call to hold a referendum, arguing more Australians were worried about the cost-of-living crisis.
The Sunrise host grilled the Opposition leader about spending hundreds of millions of dollars on an issue that was not front and centre in the lives of most Aussies.
Mr Dutton said he would support calls to back a referendum that would allow politicians to deport dual citizens from the country if he won the federal election.
‘Do you really want to send voters to another referendum poll?’ Barr asked on Tuesday.
Mr Dutton defended his decision and said his first priority was keeping the country safe.
‘My argument is if you betray your allegiance to our country in that way you should expect to lose your citizenship,’ he said.
‘We would never grant somebody citizenship if we knew they were going to plan a terrorist attack.’
Barr questioned Mr Dutton whether a change to the constitution, through referendum, was the only way to go about the issue.
Nat Barr (pictured) has questioned the priorities of Peter Dutton following his call to hold a referendum, arguing more Australians were worried about the cost-of-living crisis
‘Dual citizens can be deported if they’re sentenced to more than three years if they have a crime terrorism. The last referendum didn’t go down well cost and $400million,’ she said.
‘Can’t we do it some other way?’
Dutton shot back: ‘You can’t out legislate the constitution, the constitution is the rule book.
‘As you point out with The Voice, it was the wrong issue for the government to put to the people. It could have been dealt with by legislation. The Prime Minister wouldn’t explain the logic, rationale and impact of The Voice. That’s why it went down.
‘What we’re proposing here is a discussion about whether we have adequate laws, whether the constitution is restrictive and ultimately what I want to do is keep our country safe and community safe.
‘There are a lot of Australians at the moment who are worried about the rise of antisemitism and what we’ve seen in our country and elsewhere which doesn’t reflect the values we fought for over many generations.’
Barr continued to press Mr Dutton on if deportation was a priority, considering most Australians are more concerned with the cost of living crisis.
‘The first issue is to try to keep people safe. That’s always the first responsibility,’ Mr Dutton answered.
‘In terms of cost of living, of course, that’s our priority economically because the government has made a number of decisions in in the past two budgets which have made it harder for Australians. I don’t think the threat of inflation has gone away.’
Barr questioned: ‘Do we spend money on a referendum right now when everyone can’t afford their tomato sauce?’
Mr Dutton said: ‘If you want to keep your kids safe in our community, I don’t think you can put a price on that.
‘You can deal with community safety and at the same time you can make good economic decisions to help people deal with Labor’s 30 per cent increase in grocery prices.
‘That’s how we would approach it.’
A referendum would be required for Mr Dutton’s proposed change to dual citizenship due to a 2022 High Court ruling.
The court found it was unconstitutional for a ministerial power to strip a person of citizenship as it was a form of ‘punishment in the sense of retribution’.
The ruling was made in the case of a man who joined the Islamic State and had his citizenship revoked, which was reversed by the High Court.
Australia’s current citizenship laws have allowed people convicted of terrorism, like Abdul Nacer Benbrika (pictured), to remain in the country
A similar ruling in 2023 allowed Abdul Nacer Benbrika to retain his Australian citizenship and remain in the country after plotting two terrorist attacks in Melbourne and directing a terrorist organisation.
He was released from prison in 2023 after serving 20 years.
Australia’s current laws allow a dual citizen to be deported under a judge’s ruling so long as they’ve been sentenced to more than three years and committed crimes that ‘repudiated their allegiance to Australia’, like terrorism or treason.
The law requires the reason for a person’s deportation to be something other than punishment, like community safety.
