Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has said the Chinese and Indian diaspora and people relying on aged care or hospital services are at the front line of an increasingly divisive fight over citizenship and what it means to be an Australian.
In his most strident attack on a Coalition plan to restrict welfare payments only to citizens, Albanese on Sunday said he would never draw a distinction between citizens and permanent migrants who prove their commitment to Australia.
Liberal leader Angus Taylor last month revealed plans to restrict access to 17 welfare programs to Australian citizens only, declaring the move as “putting Australians first”.
People already on benefits such as the age pension, carer’s payments or the NDIS would be grandfathered while humanitarian immigrants, people facing domestic violence or those needing emergency assistance would be exempt from the change, which the Coalition says will save billions of dollars.
Last week, the Coalition seized on figures revealed in a Senate estimates hearing that 51,000 permanent residents had accessed the federal government’s 5 per cent home deposit scheme. The scheme, started by the Morrison government but expanded to all potential first home buyers, is available to permanent residents.
Albanese, opening an urgent care clinic on the Sunshine Coast on Sunday, said it was increasingly difficult to see a difference between the Coalition and One Nation as they went down a “rabbit hole” over migrants becoming permanent residents.
He said the Coalition’s plan would deny services to people who had lived and worked in Australia for decades and who in some cases had found it difficult to renounce their previous citizenship such as citizens from China or India.
“They’ve got to renounce their citizenship in their country of birth, and that might lead to consequences for them and the relationship they have with relatives back in their country of birth, to treat them differently,” he said.
“One thing that you won’t hear from me is drawing a distinction between Australians and migrants who are permanent residents. Permanent residents are people who’ve made a commitment to Australia.”
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, between 2000 and 2021, about 3 million migrants became permanent residents. Of those, 1.8 million became citizens. The highest citizenship rate was among people from South Africa (74 per cent), Sri Lanka (71 per cent) and the Philippines (68.5 per cent).
Current rules around welfare mean there are waiting periods for permanent residents to access welfare, including four years for JobSeeker and 10 years for the age pension.
Albanese said discrimination against permanent residents would ultimately hurt all Australians, particularly those needing health or aged care.
“Go into an aged care facility and see how older Australians would get the services they need if somehow we throw out all the permanent residents, don’t allow them to have a house, don’t allow them to have any access to services,” he said.
“This is the divisive route that the Liberals and Nationals want us to go down.”
Shadow treasurer Tim Wilson on Sunday attacked One Nation over its policy on home ownership among permanent residents and non-citizens.
During the week, former Nationals leader and now One Nation MP Barnaby Joyce was forced to correct his own understanding of his party’s policy after initially saying permanent residents would have to sell their home before he then said only non-citizens would have two years in which to vacate their property.
Wilson said forcing “lawful property owners” to sell their homes seemed a violent way to deal with people “who are here paying taxes”.
But pressed on the Coalition’s own policy to deny welfare to taxpaying permanent residents, Wilson linked the issue to broader support for immigration.
“I don’t believe that everybody has to become an Australian citizen, but I absolutely believe that it’s good that people come here, commit here, and contribute to the future of the country,” he told Sky News.
“If you look at generations past, when migration’s enjoyed a high level of public confidence, it’s because people have come to this country, they’ve committed to this country, and they’ve contributed to this country, because Australians justifiably understand that if you want to be able to take from a system, you also have to contribute to it.”
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Shane Wright is a senior economics correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect via X or email.