Absolutely ignorance of the law is no excuse and a person's ignorance of their posirion under the law is no excuse either. It was their obligation and their parties obligation to check and they are clearly in breach of the law.

But what about the people they and their party machines defeated in the elections? Noone thinks about them. They probably spent a lot of their own money in the election, gave a lot of their time in the election and lost to an illegal opponent.

Maybe some of those people might consider suing these people who have been adjudged wrongfully elected via the Supreme court. Surely they deserve some consideration.

And finally what about the voters of the other people whose candidate should have won and missed out through these failings of theses others?

Finally if the others had have been elected what would that have done to the make up of parliament?

There is so much wrong with this and I think charges need to be laid also!

Sorry, but that's a ridiculous statement. I mean, where do you draw the line.

What about a tradie who claims to be qualified, but in reality is not, do we have them repay their earnings?

Or an unlicensed driver who has managed to derive an income from their untruthfulness?

Rather than worry about citizenship for our pollies, I would rather lobby for accountability. I for one think all ministers should have mandatory professional indemnity insurance, where we pay the premium, but they pay any loadings, At least then we might have saved some money for future generations. Stuff up after stuff up yet not one red cent paid back to the tax payer.

As far as stuff ups go, you would go a long way to find a more wasteful period than the Rudd Gillard Rudd era, yet they are sitting pretty for the rest of their lives, at our expense.

This whole citizenship issue is just more political point scoring I'm afraid as their citizenship has no influence on their abilities. Not that many seem to have much in that area I'm afraid.

The modern day polly, in general, suffers from 'all about me' syndrome I'm afraid, and the voters needs/wishes are all but ignored

Sorry Rechtub but your examples bare no relevance to the discussion.

We are talking about claiming and receiving moneys that the politicians werent entitled in that they breached the law of the land by getting elected when they weren't entitled to be elected.'

The Centrelink comparison is the perfect example and so there is no line to draw.

If a person knowingly or unknowingly is overpaid by Centrelink or breaks the law claiming money from Centrelink they face two outcomes. The first is pay back the money and/or if an illegal act happened they can be charged with fraud. Rightly so of course!

So these politicians , (even if they were unaware of their status), were wrongfully elected into parliament and were wrongfully paid salaries and benefits when they were ineligible to receive those moneys due to their citizenship status.

They have been paid Government moneys wrongfully.

They ran for office when they weren't entitled, got elected when they weren't entitled and claimed salaries and benefits when they weren't entitled.

Legally they must pay the moneys back BUT they also should they be charged with a crime against the Commonwealth? The laws are quite specific! Section 44 states -

44. Any person who -

(i.) Is under any acknowledgement of allegiance, obedience, or adherence to a foreign power, or is a subject or a citizen or entitled to the rights or privileges of a subject or citizen of a foreign power:

The media and the politicians are running quiet on the penalty side of this stuff because as usual the politicians are protecting their own.

They all love to talk tough about a poor family or individual being overpaid by Centrelink so the same standards should apply to Politicians wrongfully paid by the Government. Why should different rules apply to poor people and those same rules applied to Pollies.

If a politician is elected by not doing his/her duty of care under the constitution and checking their citizen status then they must be held accountable fully. That accountability includes paying back their debt to the Citizens of Australia..

Today's Herald Sun (31st October 2017) printed the
following letter by Graham Williams which is worth
a read:

"The recent High Court decisions highlight the absurdity of
Section 44 of the Constitution.

What purpose does it have?

While federal politicians with dual citizenship are denied
access to top secret data, that same information crosses
the desks of military personnel, civil servants and
contractors, with the same citizenship status on a daily
basis.

Neither the British parliament nor the US Congress, both of
which served as models for the Australian parliament,
prohibit dual citizens from holding public office.

What would the High Court have decided on the fate of some
of our prime ministers, all of whom were eligible for
parliament on the grounds of the constitutional
requirement that they be subjects of the Queen?

That was deemed sufficient a condition for eligibility, but
the High Court has overturned that ruling.

What would have become of Billy Hughes, our wartime prime
minister, born in London? How about the Scottish-born
Andrew Fisher or the Staffordshire-born Joseph Cook?

What would the High Court have thought of Chris Watson, who
thought he was born in the UK, but was actually born in
Valparaiso, Chile?

Surely, it's time to get rid of this archaic anomaly,
drafted in a bygone era of different standards and
expectations, yet which continues to disrupt the functions
of government".

Hear, Hear!

That's great Foxy! And if the people of Australia decide through a referendum to get rid of that part of Section 44 well and good.

It probably would fail a referendum but put it to the people!

The problem is that isn't the law today and when these law breakers were elected!!

Under the current constitution these people nominated for office when not entitled, won office when not entitled, sat in the parliament when not entitled and received payments and benefits whilst not entitled.

All this crowing for changing this part of Section 44 misses the point entirely.

These ex-members have broken the law. These ex-members have been paid to sit whilst not entitled to sit and not entitled to remuneration based on that ineligibility to sit.

If it was a poor unemployed individual or family that had been paid wrongly by Centrelink the Pollies would be screaming from the rafters.

Suddenly when some of them have been paid wrongly silence is deafening!

Waste money on a referendum OR get politicians to do their due diligence I don't care either way.

As the law stands today they have a debt to pay to Australians... Are you suggesting rules for the poor and separate more relaxed and favourable rules for the Pollies?

Foxy,

I was well aware of the ramifications of dual citizenship under the Constitution, so the Deputy Prime Minister and the Prime Minister should have also been so aware; or is it that I'm just smarter than they are?