Julian Hill (Bruce, Australian Labor Party, Assistant Minister for Citizenship, Customs and Multicultural Affairs) Share this | Hansard source

Well, they might say it's grandfathered. That's what they said when they had to clean up this mess. That's not what was said in the budget reply speech. The other thing I would observe is that, let's pretend what you say is true—and I don't believe it—you haven't put a single costed policy out. The way the citizenship law works is that there will continue to be thousands of families in this country with Australian citizen children and permanent resident parents. That's how the citizenship law works. For years and decades into the future, there will be Australian citizen kids, often with permanent resident parents, and the Liberal Party will be saying, 'No, no, you're an Australian citizen kid, but we're going to take your family payments away and push your family into poverty.' Have they really thought this through? What about the Australian citizens who are in exactly the same situation overseas, living in New Zealand, living in other countries? Are you now going to say to other countries 'come after Australian citizens and muck up their families'?

This is a giant dog whistle to One Nation, because of their blind panic and their strategic mistake in thinking they can out Pauline Pauline. That's what this dystopian budget reply was about. It's not about modern Australia. It's not about supporting families who pay tax. It's a giant panicked dog whistle to One Nation.

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