Why has it taken the Leader of the Democrat's so long to react to JWH's citizen's test ? For that matter, of all the issues confronting the Senate impinging on Oz values since Don Chipp's celebrated invocation : ' keeping the bastards honest ' circa 1977 ? Fact is: Allison's recent foray is decicedly any thing BUT.

Speak's volumes of thirty years of abysmal, biodiversified irrelevance. Kernot, Lees, Haines, Despoja and now LA. One and all feathering their own. A profligate liability; an imposition on the long suffering, tax-paying electorate. Realistically, these fringe party's achieve little - they lack the crunch numbers in both houses. An Oz characteristic ? Vote Pauline Hanson.

Allison's cringe, centre's not on the historical military overtones of the citizen's test; the Tampa, the Siev X debacle where 335 Indonesians perished, 146 being children, but on a narroow politician's outlook - women are a minority in Parliament and Corporate boardrooms ?? Fact is, US high profile women slog tooth and nails in the World's most prolific rat-race to attain CEO status. Their newly won gains are perceptively short lived. You have got to earn it girlie !

The Citizen's teat is nothing compared to the 1901 Immigration Restriction Act - commonly known as the detested " White Australian Policy Act ". Applicants wishing to enter Aust were restricted to a ' diction test ' in any European language, not nesessarily English ! It was a deterrent specific for Asians, Coloured and Islanders. In 1958, the Act was repealed by the Migration Act, allowing the Minister absolute discretion on all applications. Coincidenly, UK exodus migrant intake was at it's peak. Paying only ten quid to settle or holiday in the Land of Opportunity. The Bureaucrats administering the test employed full time interpreters. Less than 2% of the population spoke a foreign language. The Labour Party under Edmund Barton ( question 10 ) was responsible for this largess. Has the Immigration Department methodology improved ?

Citizen Wannabe's have to swear allegiance to a Monarch residing in a polygot decadent multicultural Island 16000 miles away ! Ken Andrew's evidently

ensured Republican's had minimal input to his manifesto.

Whether it's solemn Oaths or Vows taken on the Christian Bible is anything to go by, we have druggies, rapists, wife-bashers, child-killers etc religiously swearing in the Courts, daily professing their innocence ? The Judiciary it seems conveniently overlooks perjury as a serious crime ? Marriage vows attest to growing prevalence of divorces, seperations, defections, with 1:2 Aust's opting out of wedlock. Why bother to wave a dead chicken ?

Q2. Indigenous have lived in Oz for 40,000 years before Capt Cook raised the Union Jack over terra australas! In the 229 years of exemplary Western Democracy, the wretched Abo is no better off. It took a Referendum 40 years ago to merely recognise his existance !
Hitherto, him, his missus and piiccaninny were galactic aliens.

His lot has never been easy-street. Aboriginal History has been a chronology of sanitised mythology fashioned by historian's on million dollar Govt grants who would swear Austwitz was a Yiddish gallimaufry creation; gas chambers, an extravaganza orchestrated by the endearing Wiggles ! So much for professional integrity. The ' stolen generation ', Tasman massacres, poisoned waterholes are fringe bits. Genocide, infanticide, dispossession, human rights abuses, the litany rivals the decimation of the proud American Indian Race, the Inca's, ethnic Albanians, Kosovo ad infinitum.

The recent brouhaha involving police sergeant Hurley on Palm Island is indicative of racial discrimination erupting into murder, albeit manslaughter. Despite the Coroner's Court evidence, his contradiction on Oath, on four occasions, perjury, he was later exonerated at trial. The CMC investigating white-washed the inquiry. Dozen's of uniformed police, senior Officers, and obfuscating Union hierarchy attended daily proceedings. Intimidating ?

Q14. Which of the following are Australian values ?
a. Men and women are equal
b. A 'fair go '
c. Mateship
d. All of the above

I have yet to see equality in the workplace, sporting arena or family unit.Allison, for all her navel-gazing readilly admits is ' pie-in-the-sky 'rhetoric - relegated to the cultural propaganda delusion ala Canberra. Mateship, fair go, is as relevant today as the Cronulla fiasco and aftermath.

Well done Lyn Allison and Anna Bligh!

I feel confident about the future of Australia with politicians of this calibre ready to stand up for those being unfairly demonised.

Oh! Boy, another cringing apologist. Not uncommon for a Democrat I suppose.
It is not going to HURT any new comer to study Australian history or laws or traditions.
Anything done by the Liberals to keep the peace in Oz is going to be howled down by the lidiots as this is being.
Too many with not enough to occupy their tiny minds is the trouble.
The Citizenship swearing in should include a sworn contract to keep the peace, keep Australian laws and leave the old tribal laws behind.
That is what the new test should include.

Lyn Allison’s article has perfectly captured the zeitgeist of the 60’s and 70’s. It was a crazy time back then when people disengaged from society’s rules and norms. Women back then burned their bras as a symbolic declaration of their freedom. Lyn was the first (and only) female to burn her bra while she was still wearing it. It was a presageful and silly act nevertheless noted by Uncle Don, another discontented person. Over the years Lyn has witnessed the Democrats tap their exclusive rich vein of comic geniuses. The Democrats gave us Cheryl (Oh! That red dress) the coquette who was seduced by matinee idol Gareth Gareth. Cheryl left her family and eloped with Gareth Gareth to Gretna Green. On their return to Australia, Cheryl pleaded for a safe suburb to call home but the best Gareth Gareth could offer was a dump in Dickson. Lemons replaced violins. The Democrats continued to entertain us when they chose a leader who wanted to open a VIP airline to conduct flights from Manus Island to Australia. The only cargo would be stray cats. Lyn is now part of the Democrat’s harlequinade. It is odd that a person who must obey her party’s rules and regulations and the Senate’s rules and regulations should find fault with rules attaching to becoming an Australian citizen.

Miacat, you are correct that we need to eradicate racism in Australia but accepting Chinese migrants won’t do anything other than perpetuate racism. Wasn’t it Confucius who praised the black-haired people above all others? Wasn’t it Confucius who said white people might benefit from falling under the control of the black-haired people? I’m sure the sayings of Confucius have been dinned into the Chinese.

I remember about 50 years ago facing a test in Anthropology 100 which included the question "on which side of their outrigger canoe does a Trobriand Islander paddle?" I understand that about a half the year guessed correctly and the other half incorrectly. I was outraged and stomped off to confront the lecturer about the inanity of the question. His response has stayed with me. He agreed it was trivia. But he asserted that in future we would be more likely to read our textbooks and observe behaviour more closely because we might be tested on it.
There is a strong likelihood that I would fail the citizenship test, many of the items seem more suitable for a trivia night quiz. But the idea of setting a hurdle to motivate people to attend to citizenship kinds of thing is not all bad. No effort should be spared to revise the booklet and have it contain relevant and useful aspects of citizenship.