22.
Deane and Gaudron JJ, in separate judgments, would have held that the renunciation of any foreign allegiance at the naturalisation ceremonies of Mr Delacretaz and Mr Kardamitsis was sufficient to take each of them out of the disqualification in s 44(i)[1]. It is evident that this view did not commend itself to the other five Justices, who proceeded on the basis that a unilateral renunciation was not sufficient to terminate the status of citizenship under the foreign law.
No member of the majority in Sykes v Cleary said that a candidate who does not know that he or she is a citizen of a foreign country can be said to take reasonable steps to renounce that citizenship by doing nothing at all in that regard. It is true that Dawson J said that what is reasonable will "depend upon such matters as the requirements of the foreign law for the renunciation of the foreign nationality, the person's knowledge of his foreign nationality and the circumstances in which the foreign nationality was accorded to that person."[2] His Honour may be taken, consistently with the views expressed by the plurality and by Brennan J, with whom he agreed, to have had in mind cases where not only the tenacity but also the inaccessibility of the foreign law was apt practically to prevent an Australian citizen from exercising the choice to participate in the system of representative government established by the Constitution. It may be that not all foreign states afford their citizens the levels of assistance in relation to the ascertainment and renunciation of their citizenship that is available from states such as most members of the Commonwealth of Nations. Some foreign states may be unwilling or unable to provide necessary information in relation to the ascertainment and means of renunciation of their citizenship.
The plurality in Sykes v Cleary said that the steps reasonably available to a candidate to free himself or herself from the ties of foreign citizenship depend on "the situation of the individual, the requirements of the foreign law and the extent of the connexion between the individual and the foreign State"[3]. The circumstance that Mr Kardamitsis had participated in a naturalisation ceremony in which he had expressly renounced his foreign allegiance was not sufficient to justify the conclusion that he had taken reasonable steps to divest himself of his foreign citizenship because under the foreign law he could have applied for the
