The former Howard government immigration minister Amanda Vanstone has said she despaired to learn that people on her side of politics thought it was acceptable for a minister to revoke an Australian citizen’s rights “in the blink of an eye”.



In a strongly worded intervention in the debate on forthcoming counter-terrorism laws, Vanstone accused her former colleague, prime minister Tony Abbott, of throwing the Westminster system of cabinet government out the window. She also warned that “cutting down our democratic protections to get at the enemy is profoundly dumb”.



“One of the main reasons I am a Liberal is the commitment to individual rights, the belief that you and I can and should do things for ourselves, with the state only sticking its bigger and bigger beak into our lives when it is really needed,” Vanstone writes in her regular column for Fairfax Media on Monday.

“I’m for individual freedom … to the max. So you can imagine my profound disappointment, bordering on despair, when I see some on ‘my team’ thinking it is OK for a minister alone to take away a citizen’s rights – indeed, take away citizenship – in the blink of an eye. No appeal, no judicial process, just a ministerial decision. What were they thinking?”



Vanstone’s article adds to concerns held by legal experts, some ministers, several Coalition backbenchers, and the human rights commission president, Gillian Triggs, about the extent to which the government should increase executive power in dealing with alleged terrorists.



While more than 40 Coalition backbenchers have signed a letter urging Abbott to take a tougher stand, the communications minister, Malcolm Turnbull, has warned that the fight against terrorism is not a question of “bravado” and he has emphasised the importance of upholding the rule of law.

The government will soon introduce legislation to give the immigration minister, Peter Dutton, the power to revoke the Australian citizenship of dual nationals deemed to be involved in terrorism, even if they have not been convicted of a crime. But the government has deferred a decision about similar powers targeting sole Australian nationals who might be able to apply for citizenship elsewhere, following a backlash from ministers worried about the proposal and the way in which it was brought to cabinet.

In her column, Vanstone stresses the need for proper cabinet processes on substantial policy issues and criticises the way the citizenship discussion was handled. This, she says, “was not a minor policy issue escaping proper process, but a fundamental issue as to your and my liberty almost escaping any discussion at all”.

“Tony Abbott is a constitutional monarchist and a self-confessed Anglophile, so for him to tolerate, let alone be at the helm of, a ship that throws the Westminster system of cabinet government out the window is simply astounding,” Vanstone writes.

“There’s nothing new and therefore sudden about dealing with terrorism that justifies this suggestion not going through proper cabinet process. In fact the very seriousness of the threat terrorism poses and this suggested response demands a full discussion.

“Hoping to flick it through at the end of a cabinet meeting smacks of trying to get something difficult through without proper discussion. That’s either lazy, sneaky or both.”

Vanstone says the debate is not about anyone being weak on terrorists. She argues the government’s assurances that the policy will now have appropriate safeguards are a direct result of the contributions of cabinet ministers who were “prepared to risk the PM’s ire and stand up for our rights”.



The cabinet meeting in question occurred two weeks ago. The following day, Abbott emphasised that the legislation would include an avenue of judicial review for people who wanted to challenge a ministerial decision to revoke citizenship.

He also stressed that the laws would be focused on dual nationals, while the contentious topic of sole nationals would be considered after the government received public feedback triggered by a discussion paper.

The Victorian president of the Liberal party, Michael Kroger, said Vanstone’s strongly worded article “surprised us all a bit”.



“I see the point she’s making … but you’ve got to remember this. The decisions of the minister would be subject to judicial review,” Kroger told Sky News on Monday.

“The cabinet was pretty alive to the debate and obviously that’s a good thing.”



But Kroger said the prime minister had support from “90% of the rank and file” membership of the Liberal party for strong action against Islamic State (Isis).



“So far as the public is concerned, people do not want people who go over there fighting for organisations that behead people to come back and live in our suburbs,” he said.



“This organisation is the modern day Nazi party. They are the Pol Pot of our generation. There’s nothing more despicable and inhuman than this group Isis.”

Dutton confirmed on Sunday that he would be able to be use the power against dual nationals regardless of whether they were in Australia or abroad. The government believed it was “a decision for the minister of the day, because we are elected by the people to make these tough decisions”, he told Channel Ten’s Bolt Report.



Asked why the minister, and not a court, would make the decision, Dutton said: “Well, because we need ministerial discretion around some of the particular cases. So where the 17-year-old Australian goes across and is involved in beheadings and strapping vests on to other young kids who then go off and do suicide bombings – that person may present a very different case than the 17-year-old who went across, got cold feet at the airport and decided to come back home. If we had a black-letter operation of the law and there was no discretion, I think we would get anomalies … We’re not trying to impose this as a criminal sanction.”

Triggs, who has been at loggerheads with the government over asylum seeker policies and the rule of law, delivered a forthright speech on Friday in which she criticised the major political parties for teaming up to pass “scores of laws” over the past 15 years that threatened fundamental rights and freedoms.

Triggs cited the yet-to-be-defined citizenship proposal as an example of the “overreach of executive power” and said the debate seemed to be “between the subjective suspicions of a minister versus an evidence-based determination by a judge according to established rule of law”.

The Coalition backbench is considered to be broadly supportive of tougher actions against alleged terrorists, including sole nationals. But the conservative South Australian senator Cory Bernardi spoke out last week against revoking the citizenship of sole nationals, saying vesting such a significant power in a minister was wrong as a matter of principle and opened the way for “dangerous” power creep.