The Citizenship Test What's all the fuss about?

Should people who migrate to Australia or land here as refugees learn something about the history, culture and way of life in Australia and prove it, before they are allowed to become citizens?

Sounds reasonable, it's something that should actually help those who are newly arrived to 'fit in.'

However in the history of this country we have never before set people a test which they had to pass to get citizenship.

So why NOW?

The recently defeated Australian government, with the full support of the party that won the elections introduced a Citizenship test that appears to be too hard, as many of those who currently sit the test, actually fail.

Having looked at the test, I have to say that I cannot find anything in it that is so difficult.

Given that all the answers are actually provided to potential examinees, free of charge and translated into some 29 languages, given that there is no limit to the number of times that someone can sit the test and that there is no castigation of anyone who fails the test I am uncertain what all the fuss is about and why the current government wants to dumb down the test.

OK I take the point that it's apparently no longer a "free ride" to become an Australian citizen, why are some people so upset about it all.

"The Federal Government has rejected a call by the New South Wales Ethnic Communities Council to dump the controversial citizenship test.

The Government has launched a review of the test, which asks immigrants questions about Australia's values, history and way of life.

The review has been prompted by the release of statistics which show out of nearly 11,000 citizenship tests taken, more than 2,000 people failed."

I guess the question is WHY they they failed the test?

Was it because it was in English and they can't speak the language?

If this proves to be the case, surely the question should be "what facilities exist to assist them to learn the language?" and "what incentives are there to ensure that they are able to feed their families while they do so?"

Was it because some people simply don't want to learn about Australia's history and culture or deal with Australian values?

Hardly - they would then simply not bother to take the test.

Some people in the community I am sure would love to be able to argue that there are those in the community now who want to retain their old values and cultural ways and actually impose them on the community that they have joined and in this process sow the seeds of disharmony.

Personally I don't think anyone already living here will permit this to happen. What they will permit however is the enrichment of the existing culture in much the same way that waves of immigrants have always shaped and enriched this land.

The reality for Australia is that most of the population has migrated here from somewhere other than Australia. Indeed the history of this land and its values have been formed by immigrants (voluntary or otherwise) and like most unplanned roads or pathways has developed in a higgledy piggledy fashion over time.

So back to my questions, why, all of a sudden, a citizenship test and why such a fuss?

Assuming that it is a way to assist people to learn about the country that they have chosen to come to and assuming that it is NOT meant to hostile to those who do come to live here - why is there so much pressure to get rid of the test?

I am certainly happy to hear from any reader who has some idea what all the fuss is about!