Councillor wants new test scrapped
By Isabell Petrinic
Fairfield Champion, 17 October 2007

WITH a federal election date set, Fairfield councillor Thang Ngo has called on all parties to support his call to abolish the controversial citizenship test.

Cr Ngo said that you can't test someone's commitment to a country through a written test.

"What proves that you are committed to a country is that you are willing to risk your life and your family's on the seas as a boat person," Cr Ngo said.

The Vietnamese community in NSW has thrown its support behind the local councillor, whose family left Vietnam in 1975 when he was eight years old.

"Given most of our people come here as a spouse, [the test's difficulty] doesn't make sense - their husband is an Australian citizen already," the group's assisting co-ordinator, Kim Anh Tran, said.

Cabramatta has the highest number of residents born in non-English countries (65.6 per cent).

It also has the highest number (6802 residents) and proportion (50.5 per cent) of poor English speakers, according to Fairfield Council's State of the Community Report.

"The language barrier makes it difficult for many of them [to pass the citizenship test]," Ms Tran said.

In fact, Fairfield City residents have settled here from more than 130 countries and speak more than 70 different languages.

The majority of residents speak a language other than English at home, the most common being Vietnamese, Cantonese, Assyrian and Spanish.

But Ricci Bartels, co-ordinator for the Fairfield Migrant Resource Centre, said: "We haven't had any major issues raised with us at this point."

She said the centre would provide information and education about the new citizenship processes.

This would include letting clients know about the cost of the test, what it is about, how to apply and, "should they fail", letting them know they can apply again.

"Because the government is touting this as an important mechanism to ensure that new citizens embrace Australian values and culture, in that context if the average Aussie isn't able to answer the questions and they are, you can conclude that new arrivals will make better citizens than Australian-born," Ms Bartels said.

Mayor Nick Lalich said the council had received no feedback from the community on the new citizenship test. The council hosts monthly citizenship ceremonies with about 120 residents.

"Residents who have completed the new citizenship test will receive their citizenship certificates early next year," the mayor said.

"At that time, council will have a better idea of the impact the citizenship test has had on the number of residents receiving citizenship."

Cr Ngo said that it was appalling that both the government and Labor passed the citizenship bill.