Hundreds of thousands of migrants are waiting over sixteen months to become Australian citizens despite a massive decline in the number of citizenship applications last year.
Of the 221,000 people with pending applications for Australian citizenship, Indian migrants lead the pack with nearly 30,000 applications, followed by those from the United Kingdom (27,000) and China (17,000). Prospective citizens now face an average waiting time of 493 days to make their pledge of allegiance to Australia, up from 167 days in 2012-13.
Most of that waiting period comprises of time from when an application is lodged to its approval or denial by the Department. Currently, the average time for that step is 410 days, which was 63 days in 2012-13. The next and final part of the process is attending a citizenship ceremony organised by an applicant's local council.
