FEDERAL independent candidate Kate Hulett faces a desperate race to repeal her British citizenship, otherwise her campaign will come to a crashing halt.
On her campaign podcast A Piece of Kate, the Armadale-born Ms Hulett revealed she has held Australian and British passports since she was a baby.
Under Section 44 of the Australian Constitution, any person who is “subject…to the rights or privileges or a citizen of a foreign power” is “incapable” of sitting in the House of Reps.
Unless Ms Hulett revokes her British citizenship in time, she will be disqualified from sitting in Parliament.
Ms Hulett says she attempted to renounce her citizenship earlier in her campaign, but was told by the British Home Office it would take six months.
Her deadline is April 10, the last day to nominate for the election.
Ms Hulett was critical of what podcast cohost and chief of staff Emma Pegrum labelled an “archaic” section of the Constitution.
“It feels like the rules are designed for the Australia of 50 or 60 years ago,” Ms Pegrum said.
“It comes back to the idea of having a Parliament made up of people from all backgrounds and places to speak on behalf of the people, for which it represents totally,” Ms Hulett replied.
Notre Dame politics professor Martin Drum agreed, saying Section 44 is “outdated” given Australia’s multicultural population.
“We’ve got citizens from all over the place, which effectively means that huge numbers of people are actually ineligible to be elected,” Prof Drum said.
“It discriminates against a lot of migrants despite the fact we are a migrant country… it doesn’t matter where you came from, whether it’s England or Zimbabwe or Bangladesh.”
The rule will be difficult to alter, Prof Drum says.
“You can still campaign… it’s happened in the past, where people have stood for election, got elected, and then the High Court has determined that they’re ineligible and declares them unelected, and we’d have a by-election.
“In this particular case, the fact that it’s come up before close of nominations would suggest that you don’t nominate if you haven’t resolved it.”
However, Ms Hulett is hopeful it will all work out.
“I do not expect that some silly paperwork nonsense is going to stop me from getting to election day and absolutely nailing the brief,” she said.
by KATHERINE KRAAYVANGER