Australian passport plan causes much confusion

Press, 29 April 1981, Page 1

Australian passport plan causes much confusion

Citizens of New Zealand will still be allowed unrestricted entry into Australia from July 1, when they will be required to carry a passport. The effects of the Australian change in policy were detailed yesterday by the Minister of Internal Affairs (Mr Highet). Permanent residents who are not New Zealand citizens must have a visa issued by the Australian Government allowing them to enter Australia as well as the passport on which they travel. They must also have a re-entry permit for New Zealand. “The Australian. High Commission should be contacted for advice by any person who is not a New Zealand citizen and intends to travel to Aus-

tralia,” Mr Highet said. Permanent residents who are not New Zealand citizens should also seek advice from the Australian authorities about their right to work in Australia. The new regulations do not affect New Zealand citizens’ rights to work in Australia. Mr Highet suggested that New Zealanders intending to travel to Australia in July should get a passport application form now and start putting the necessary documents together. The form and documents should be forwarded to the nearest Internal Affairs office together with a remittance of $2O a passport. “If the form is carefully filled in, and all the necessary documents produced,

there will be little delay,” said Mr Highet.

He asked New Zealanders intending to travel later in the year to hold back their passport applications for a little while, to ease the flow of applications and allow rapid processing of the papers of those who are going to Australia in July. Mr Highet said that Australians already in New Zealand were required to have a passport if they were returning to Australia after July 1. “They might be well advised to consult the Australian Government’s representatives in New Zealand.” he said. In the meantime, Australians and New Zealanders will continue to enter New Zealand without re-

quiring passports and without the need for a visa. The new passport restrictions apply only to entry to Australia. Plans to introduce passports for New Zealanders travelling to Australia will have a serious effect on women going there for abortions, according to a Christchurch group which has arranged abortions in Aurtralia for more than 2000 women since December. 1977. The Health Alternatives for Women group (formerly the Sisters Overseas Service) considers the passport plan would lead to long delays, thus ruling out Australia as an option for women from New Zealand seeking abortions. Women have been going to Australia when ' there

has been absolutely nothing available to them in this country, a spokesperson for T.H.A.W., Ms Lana Le Quesne said. “The very real prospect of long delays would exacerbate the injustices of an already unjust system and cause unnecessary worry to women already under pressure,” she said. Any process which could give rise to back street abortions in New Zealand must be opposed by women’s groups such as T.H.A.W., Ms Le Quesne said. New Zealand consulates round Australia were inundated with inquiries yesterday about the need for passports for Tasman travel.

“You could say we have been snowed under,” said

the Brisbane consul, Miss K. Huse.

She said some Australians were so .confused about what was going on they had even contacted the New Zealand consulate wanting Australian passports. - On a normal day the Brisbane consulate gets about six requets for passport application forms. Yesterday they had more than 160. It was the same in other posts. Sydney had telephone inquiries at a rate of • nearly one a minute during the first hour in the morning and in Melbourne there were 200 inquiries by mid-after-noon.

The consulates reported a mixed reaction to the new Australian require-

ment which comes into force on July 1, ending more than 60 years of passport-free travel between the countries.

Some people were angry, others dismayed, but the overriding atmosphere was one of resignation.

“The Australian reaction has been more that passports were inevitable and it was now only as it should be,” said Miss Huse.

The Melbourne consul, Mr W. Dolan, said they might now at long last find out how- many New Zealanders lived in Australia.

“Thev have been popping out of the woodwork,” he said. A big query has been whether New Zealanders

leaving Australia and not returning will need to produce passports on departure.

The Australian Immigration Minister, Mr lan Macphee, gave as one of the reasons for the new directive a desire to crack down on the problem of child abduction.

A spokeswoman for him said that New Zealanders would not need passports to ■ leave Australia but anyone leaving without a passport and with children would be questioned by emigration officials at the airports and asked to prove their bone fides. “It is envisaged that the greatly reduced number of people without passports will give us the opportunity to screen these people,” she said.