Livingstone and Minister for Immigration, Citizenship and Multicultural Affairs (Citizenship)

This matter concerned an application for Australian citizenship by conferral made by a citizen of the United Kingdom. The Minister's delegate refused the application on the grounds that the applicant was not of good character, as required by section 21(2)(h) of the *Australian Citizenship Act 2007* (Cth). The applicant sought review of this decision before the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.

The Tribunal was required to determine whether it was satisfied that the applicant was a person of good character at the time of the decision. This involved considering the applicant's criminal history, which included convictions for drink driving, domestic violence offences, and interlock device offences, as well as a history of domestic violence reports. The applicant had disclosed some of these offences in his application but failed to disclose others, which were revealed in a police check.

In its reasoning, the Tribunal gave significant weight to the applicant's convictions for domestic violence and repeated drink driving offences, viewing them as indicative of a pattern of behaviour and disregard for the law. While the applicant provided character references and oral evidence attempting to explain his conduct and highlight his positive attributes, the Tribunal found these insufficient to outweigh the seriousness of his offending. The Tribunal noted that previous character references provided after an earlier drink driving offence had not prevented a subsequent, more serious, drink driving offence with his child in the car. Ultimately, the Tribunal concluded that it could not be affirmatively satisfied that the applicant was of good character.

The Tribunal affirmed the delegate's decision to refuse the application for Australian citizenship by conferral.